DOMESTIC roui/niY. 
407 
great care ; a finely cavved faiapzia, or stand, was made as 
a perch for the birds. Their food was chiefly poe, or 
bruised bread fruit, rolled up in the hand like paste, and 
given in small pieces." " The natives," continues Mr Ellis, 
" were universally addicted to this sport. The inhabitants 
of one district often matched their birds against those of 
another, or those of one division of a district against those 
of another division. They never trimmed any of the fea- 
thers, but were proud to see them with heavy wings, full- 
feathered necks, and long tails," I may observe, that the 
breed of these islands do not appear to have been generally 
what in this country would have been denominated game- 
cocks, for Mr EUis incidentally mentions, that as soon as 
one bird avoided another, he was considered as vi^ or beaten. 
Victory was then declared in favour of his opponent, and 
they were immediately parted. 
This barbarous custom has ceased among the inhabitants 
of the Friendly and Society Islands since the recent esta- 
blishment of Christianity among them ; although it is still 
pursued by the practical heathens of other and more ancient 
Christian lands. It is also continued in China, and in the 
islands of the Indian Ocean. 
With the exceptions of North and South America, and 
the great Australasian Continent of New Holland, I be- 
lieve there is scarcely any considerable portion of the earth's 
surface, colonized by the human race, where poultry have 
not been known and cherished from a very remote period. 
They are now spread over the whole interior of Africa, 
whether inhabited by Moors or Negroes. Their occurrence 
in the Society Islands, in the very centre of the vast Pacific 
Ocean, and at so great a distance from either the larger 
islands, or the continental parts of Southern Asia, is a sin- 
gular circumstance in itself^ and appears still more so when 
we consider their total absence from New Holland, a coun- 
