120 
VOYAGE TO THE 
CHAP, that account, more tenacious of subjecting them to the scrutiny our 
curiosity prompted, lest the natives should suppose we were offering 
i82(i some indignity. An old man whom we interrogated as to the 
nature of the building gave us no information : but looked very serious 
whenever he was referred to the place, and seemed disposed to believe 
we were inclined to place his body there to keep the others company. 
Though we were prevented from examining these mummies by the 
watchfulness of the natives, we were more successful at the island to the 
eastward, off which we first anchored. We there found six bodies under 
a projecting part of a cliff, which overhung them sufficiently to protect 
them from the inclemency of the weather. Above them we noticed a 
child suspended by a string round its waist tied to a projecting crag. 
The bodies of the adults were placed parallel, with their heads to the 
N. E., as in the other instance. They were wrapped first in cloth, then 
in matting, and again covered over with thick folds of cloth secured by 
a small cord lashing. Mr. Collie, the surgeon, made an incision into 
the stomach of one of the newest mummies, which appeared the most 
hardened, and found the membraneous part of the abdomen dried and 
shrivelled up, enclosing an indurated earthy substance, which at first 
induced him to believe it had undergone the process of embalming ; 
but finding afterwards membranes and earthy matter within a cranium 
similarly dried, and knowing that there was no way in which any ex- 
traneous substance could have been introduced there, except by the 
vertebral canal, he was induced to alter his opinion, which, he says, had 
nothing to support it, but the idea that putrefaction must have taken 
place without some counteracting agent. This complete desiccation of 
the human frame is not unfrequent in these seas, nor indeed in other 
places ; but it requires considerable care and attention to do it effec- 
tually. The method formerly pursued at Otaheite, was to keep the corpse 
constantly wiped dry, and well lubricated with cocoa-nut oil. Our 
intercourse with the Gambier Islanders did not afford us the opportunity 
of ascertaining if this were their practice also, but we noticed the pre- 
caution of exposing the bodies upon frames three or four feet above 
the ground, that the air might freely circulate about them, and of 
keeping them well covered with folds of cloth. It is remarkable that 
