POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
415 
The floor was composed of stones, sand, and clay. 
Mr. and Mrs. Orsmond occupied one end, and we took 
up our abode in the other. 
When our goods, &c, were all brought under its cover, 
and the boats had returned to the ship, we sat down to 
rest, and could not avoid gazing on the scenes around 
us, before we began to adjust our luggage. Large 
fragments of rock were scattered at the base of the 
mountains that rose on one side of our dwelling, the 
sea rolled within a few yards on the other, and in each 
direction along the shore there was one wild and uncul¬ 
tivated wilderness. A pair of cattle that we had brought 
from New South Wales, with a young calf, all of which 
had been landed from the ship during the morning, 
were tied to an adjacent bread-fruit tree ; two or three 
milch goats from Eimeo, fastened together by bands 
of hibiscus bark tied round their horns, had already 
taken their station on the craggy projections at the 
foot of the mountain, and were cropping the herbage 
that grew in the fissures of the rocks. One of our 
little ones was smiling in the lap of its native nurse, 
while the other was playing on the dried grass lying 
by the side of the boxes on which we were sitting, 
and the natives, under the full influence of highly ex¬ 
cited curiosity thronged around us in such numbers 
as to impede the circulation of the air. 
Our first effort was to prepare some refreshment. 
The chiefs had sent us a present of bread-fruit and 
fish. A native youth, fourteen or fifteen years of age, 
leaving the crowd, carne forward, and asked if he should 
cook us some bread-fruit. We accepted his offer; he 
became a faithful servant, and continued with us till we 
removed from the islands. He fixed two large stones 
