THE PELEW ISLANDS, 
349 
as if he had been always habituated to good company; he 
adapted himfelf very readily to whatever he faw were the 
cuftoms of the country, and fully confirmed me in an opi- 
• ' 
nion which I have ever entertained, that natural good man¬ 
ners is the natural refult of natural good fenfe. 
Wherever this young man went, nothing efcaped his 
obfervation; he had an ardent defire of information, and 
thankfully received it, always expreffing a wifh to know 
by what means effects which he noticed, were produced. I 
was one day in company with him, where a young lady 
fat down to the harpficord, to fee how he was affedted 
with mufic; he appeared greatly furprized that the in- 
ftrument could throw out fo much found; it was opened, 
to let him fee its interior conftrudtion, he pored over it with 
great attention, watching how the jacks were moved, and 
feemed far more difpofed to puzzle out the means which 
produced the founds, than to attend to the mufic that was 
playing. He was afterwards requefted to give us a Pelew 
fong; he did not wait for thofe repeated intreaties which 
fingers ufually require, but obligingly began one as foon as 
afked; the tones, however, were fo harfh and difcordant, and 
his bread: feemed to labour with fo much exertion, that his 
whole countenance was changed by it, and every one’s ears 
ftunned with the horrid notes. From this fample of Pelew 
finging, it is not to be wondered, that a chorus of fuch per¬ 
formers had the effedt (as hath been related) of making our 
o, countrymen 
