401 
MARQUESA S. 
nails ; for beads, looking-glades, and fuch trifles, which 
were fo highly valued at the Society Ifles, were in no efteem 
here; and even nails, at laft, loll their value for other ar¬ 
ticles far lefs ufeful. 
The inhabitants of thefe iflands, colleflively, are with¬ 
out exception the fined race of people in this fea. For 
fine lhape and regular features, they perhaps furpafs all 
other nations. The men are pundtured, or curioufly tat. 
tooed, from head to foot. The figures are various, and 
feem to be directed more by fancy than cufiom. Thefe 
pundfures make them appear dark; but the women, who 
are but little pundtured, youths, and young children who 
are not at all, are as fair as fome Europeans. The men 
are, in general, tall ; that is, about five feet ten inches, 
or fix feet; but none were obferved fat and Sulty, nor 
were any feen that could be called meagre. Their teeth 
are not fo good, nor are their eyes fo full and lively, as 
thofe of many other nations. Their hair, like ours, is of 
many colours, except red, of which Capt. Cook faw none. 
Some have it long; but the more general cufiom is to wear 
it fhort, except a bunch on each tide of the crown, which 
they tie in a.knot. They obferve different modes in trim¬ 
ming the beard, which is, in general, long. Some part it, 
and tie it in two bunches under the chin ; others plait it; 
fome wear it loofe, and others quite fhort. 
The lateft traveller whofe works w.e have inet with, M. 
Von Langfdorff, a Ruffian, agrees with former voyagers in 
giving this character of beauty to the men, but makes it 
a queition much to the prejudice of the'niore beauteous 
fex. At Nukahiwa, (which is an ifland of the fame group 
with the Marquefas,) his attention was attradfed by a 
young man who was named Mufau Taputakava, from his 
extraordinary height, vaft ltrength, and the admirable 
proportion of his limbs and muffles : “ He was now 
twenty years old, and was fix feet two inches high, Paris 
meafure (fix feet eight inches Englifh) ; and coutifellor 
Tilefius, who unites the eye of a connoiffeur and an ar- 
tifi, faid, he never faw any one fo perfedlly proportioned. 
He took the trouble of meafuring every part of this man 
with the utmofi exadfnefs, and after our return to Europe 
imparted his obfervations to Blumenbach of Gottingen, 
who has ftudied fo afliduoufly the natural hiltory of man. 
This latter compared theie proportions with the Apollo of 
Belvedere, and found that thofe of that malter-piece of 
the finefi ages of Grecian art, in which is combined every 
poflible integer in the compofition of manly beauty, cor- 
refponded exadfly with our Mufau, an inhabitant of the 
ifland of Nukahiwa. We were told that the chief of a 
neighbouring ifland, by name Upoa, with equally exact 
proportions as Mufau, was a head taller, fo at leaft Roberts 
and Cabri both affured us; if they were correct, this man 
mull be nearly feven Paris feet high.” After fuch an ac¬ 
count of the men, we feel no fmall difappointment at the 
deffription given of the women of Nukahiwa, and can 
fcarcely yield our belief to fo great an anomaly as that of 
beauty in the male, and tiglinefs in the female, being the 
common charadteriflics of the fame race of the'human 
kind. We think that it muft have been fancy, or fome 
prejudice, rather than clear judgment, which has made 
the author deliver the following fentiment : " I muff 
confefs that in my opinion both the form and countenance 
of a well-made negrefs are more plealing and interefting, 
according to our European ideas of beauty, than thofe of 
the women in thefe iflands. We certainly found in Nu¬ 
kahiwa an Apollo of Belvedere ; but it may as certainly 
be made a queition, whether a nice obferver would not 
fooner find the original of the Medicean Venus upon the 
coalt of Africa than in the South Sea.” Captain Von 
Krufenftein, who tailed in the fame veffel, and who has 
alfo publiflied an account of the voyage, praifes and de¬ 
grades them in the fame paragraph : “ The women all 
looked well; at leaft nothing could be faid againlb their 
countenances. A well-proportioned head, a face rather 
round than long, a large fparkling eye, blooming colour, 
very good teeth, curled hair, which they ornamented with 
Vol.XIV. No. 983. 
a white band in a manner very becoming to them all, and 
the remarkably-clear colour of their bodies, may perhaps 
entitle them to a preference over the inhabitants of the 
Sandwich, Society, and Friendly,Iflands : yet an impartial 
eye might perceive many faults in them, which the com¬ 
panions of Mendana and Marchand either overlooked or 
w«uld not difcover. Their form, for inftance, is any 
thing but beautiful ; their perfon is generally fhort, and 
without carriage, and this is the cafe even with girls of 
eighteen ; their gait is likewife auk ward and unfteady, and 
their lower ftotnach particularly large; their ideas of 
b#uty muft be very different from our’s, otherwife they 
would take more pains to conceal their defeats ; a piece of 
fluff of middling fize, wrapped carelefsly round them, 
being the only covering, and that an incomplete one, of 
their beauties as well as their imperfections.” M. Von 
Langfdorff'had introduced his remarks with the following 
admiflion or qualification : “ It is highly probable that 
we faw a very few' only of the really fine and handfome 
women ; and that moft of thofe who fell under our obler- 
vation were the ladies of pleafure of the ifland.” This 
does not mend the matter: the uglieft women are not 
likely to be the ladies of pleafure in any ifland. See 
Nukahiwa. 
The clothing at the Marquefas is the fame as at Otaheite, 
and made of the fame materials ; they are neither fo plen¬ 
tiful nor fo good. The men have, for the moft part, no¬ 
thing to cover their nakednefs, except the mara, as it is 
called at Otaheite; which is a flip of cloth palled round 
the waift and betwixt the legs. This fimple drefs is fufti- 
cient for the climate, and anfwers every purpofe which 
modefty requires. The drefs of the women is a piece of 
cloth, wrapped round the loins like a petticoat, which 
reaches down below the middle of the leg, and a loofe 
mantle over the llioulders. Their principal head-drefs, 
which appears to be their chief ornament, is a fort of 
broad fillet, curioufly wrought of the fibres of the hulk of 
cocoa-nuts. In the front is fixed a mother-of-pearl fhell, 
wrought round to the fize of a tea-laucer. Before that, 
another, fmaller, of very fine tortoife-fhell, perforated into 
curious figures. Alfo before, and in the centre of that, 
is another round piece of mother-of-pearl, about the fize 
of half a crown ; and before this another piece of perfo¬ 
rated tortoiff-lhell, the fize of a (hilling. Belides this de¬ 
coration in front, fome have it alfo on each lide, but in 
fmaller pieces ; and all have fixed to them the tail-feathers 
of cocks, or tropic-birds, which, when the fillet is tied 
on, Hand upright; fo that the whole together makes a 
very lightly ornament. They wear round the neck a kind 
of ruff or necklace, made of light wood, the outer and 
upper fide being covered with lmall red peafe, which are 
fixed on with gum. They alfo wear lmall hunches of 
human hair, fattened to a firing, and tied round the legs 
and arms. Sometimes, inftead of hair, they make ufe of 
fliort feathers; but all the above-mentioned ornaments 
are ftldom feen on the fame perfon. Their common or¬ 
naments are necklaces and amulets made of (hells, &c. 
None were obferved with ear-rings, and yet all had their 
ears pierced. 
Their dwellings are in the valleys, and on the (ides of 
the hills, near their plantations. They are built like.thofe 
of Otaheite; but much meaner, and only covered with 
the leaves of the bread-tree. Molt of them are built on 
a fquare or oblong pavement of Itone, raifed fome height 
above the level of t*be ground. They have alfo fuch pave¬ 
ments near their houfes, on which they fit to eat and 
amufe themfelves. In their mode of eating, thefe people, 
fays Capt. Cook, are not fo cleanly as the Otaheiteans. 
In their cookery they were alfo dirty. Pork and fowls are 
dreffed in an oven of hot ftones, as at Otaheite ; but fruit 
and roots they roaft on the fire, and, after taking off the 
rind or (kin, put them into a platter or trough with water, 
out of which men and hogs eat at the fame time. Capt, 
Chanal, cited by Marchand, is very far from confirming 
this reproach of filthinefs, which Capt. Cook has applied 
5 K. to 
