PITCAIRN ISLAND 
521 
England. They were afterwards visited by two frigates, 
the Briton and the Tagus , and in 1825 by Captain 
Beechey in the discovery ship Blossom , who found a 
community of sixty-six persons living in a state of un¬ 
interrupted peace and harmony, and in a veritable “ garden 
of Eden.” Groves of coco-nut and bread-fruit trees 
clothed the rocks down to the water’s edge, while in the 
deep valleys tropical fruits and vegetables flourished 
luxuriantly. The village stood on a platform of rock 
shaded by plantains and fig-trees, and surrounding an 
open square covered with grass. It was encircled by 
palisades to keep out the hogs and goats which roamed 
over the island and, with fowls, supplied abundance 
of animal food. The houses of the islanders were 
clean and comfortable. Their clothing, entirely made 
from the bark of the paper-mulberry, was neat and grace¬ 
ful. They all lived as one united family, and crime, or 
even dissension, was unknown. 
Injudiciously, as we think, this intensely interesting 
social experiment was brought to an end by the inter¬ 
ference of well-meaning people. The Pitcairn Islanders 
were removed, first to Tahiti, then back again to Pitcairn 
Island. Then in 1856 they were all removed to Norfolk 
Island, far inferior to their own in climate and soil, though 
somewhat larger. In 1858 some of them returned to 
Pitcairn, where, in 1869, they were visited by Sir Charles 
Dilke, and were doing well. In 1873 Commander K. 
H. A. Mainwaring found seventy-six inhabitants on the 
island, and he remarks that epidemic or endemic diseases 
were unknown among them. In September, 1878, they 
were visited by Pear-Admiral A. E. E. De Horsey, who 
found them to have increased to ninety, all in good health, 
and quite happy; and he adds, that Captain Beechey’s testi¬ 
mony to their good qualities, given fifty-three years ago, 
