68 
POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
which he returned to England^ and arrived safely 
in the Thames; having completed his perilous 
voyage, under circumstances adapted to afford the high¬ 
est satisfaction, and to excite the sincerest gratitude 
from all who were interested in the success of the 
important enterprise. 
The departure of the Duff did not occasion any diminu¬ 
tion in the attention of the natives to the Missionaries in 
Tahiti. Pomare, Otu, Haamanemane, Paitia, and other 
chiefs, continued to manifest the truest friendship, and 
liberally supplied them with such articles as the island 
afforded. The Missionaries, as soon as they had made the 
habitation furnished by the people for their accommoda¬ 
tion in any degree comfortable, commenced with energy 
their important work. 
Their acquaintance with the most useful of the me¬ 
chanic arts, not only delighted the natives, but raised the 
Missionaries in their estimation, and led them to desire 
their friendship. This was strikingly evinced on several 
occasions, when they beheld them use their carpenters^ 
tools ; cut with a saw a number of boards out of a tree, 
which they had never thought it possible to split into 
more than two, and make with these, chests, and arti¬ 
cles of furniture. When they beheld a boat, built up¬ 
wards of twenty feet long, and six tons burden, they 
were pleased and surprised; but when the blacksmith’s shop 
was erected, and the forge and anvil were first employed 
on their shores, they were filled with astonishment. 
They had long been acquainted with the properties and 
uses of iron, having procured some from the natives of 
a neighbouring island, where a Dutch ship, belonging 
to Roggewein’s squadron, had been wrecked many 
years before they were visited by Captain Wallis. 
