22 
POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES* 
little if any subsistence. Their food is frequently 
scanty, precarious, and loathsome, sometimes consisting 
of grubs and reptiles taken in the hollow or decayed 
trees of the forest. Occasionally, however, they procure 
excellent fish from the sea, or the lakes, rivers, &c. 
Their dwellings are low huts of bark, and afford but a 
mere temporary shelter from the weather. 
They are a distinct people from the inhabitants of New 
Zealand, or the South Sea Islands 5 altogether inferior to 
them, and apparently the lowest grade of human kind. 
Their habits are fugitive and migratory, and this has per¬ 
haps greatly contributed to the failure of the benevolent at¬ 
tempts that have been made by the government and others 
to meliorate their condition, and elevate their character. 
The school for aboriginal children, under the patronage 
of the government, was a most interesting institution : I 
frequently visited it, and was surprised to learn that, 
though treated with every kindness, the young scholars, 
when an opportunity occurred, frequently left the 
school, and fled to their native woods, where every 
effort to discover the retreat, or to reclaim them, proved 
ineffectual. Notwithstanding their present abject con¬ 
dition, and all the existing barriers to their improve¬ 
ment, it is most ardently to be hoped, and most con¬ 
fidently to be anticipated, that the period will arrive, 
when this degraded and wretched people will be raised 
to the enjoyment of all the blessings of intelligence, 
civilization, and Christianity. 
