6 
POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
loretea, the Ulitea of Captain Cook, or, as it is 
now more frequently called by the natives, Raiatea, 
is the largest of the Society Islands. Its form is 
somewhat triangular, and its circumference about fifty 
miles. The mountains are more stupendous and lofty 
than those of Huahine, and in some parts equally 
broken and picturesque. The northern and western 
sides are singularly romantic; several pyramidal and 
conical mountains rising above the elevated and broken 
range, that stretches along in a direction nearly pa¬ 
rallel with the coast, and from one to three miles dis¬ 
tant from the beach. Though the shore is generally 
a gradual and waving ascent from the water’s edge 
to the mountain, it is frequently rocky and broken. 
At Mabapoto, about half way between Opoa, the site 
of their principal temple, the ancient residence of 
the reigning family, and Utumaoro at the north¬ 
east angle of the island, there is a deep indentation 
in the coast. The rocks rise nearly perpendicular in 
some places on both sides, and the smooth surface 
of the ocean extends a mile and a half, or two miles, 
towards the mountains. The shores of this seques¬ 
tered bay are covered with sand, shells, and broken 
coral. At the openings of several of the little glens 
which surround it, the cottages of the natives are 
seen peeping through the luxuriant foliage of the 
pandanus, or the purau; while the cultivated plantations 
in various parts extend from the margin of the 
sea to the foot of the mountains. The rivers that roll 
along their rocky courses from the head of the 
ravines to the ocean below—and the distant mountains, 
that rise in the interior—combine to form, though 
on a limited scale, the most rich, romantic, and 
