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POLYNESIAN RBSEACRHES. 
than was barely sufficient for his own use seldom re¬ 
mained long in his possession. A present of food was 
usually accompanied with several hundred yards of 
native cloth^ and a number of fine large double canoes; 
yet every article was often distributed among the chiefs 
and favourites on the very day it arrived; and so urgent 
were the applicants^ that they did not wait till the 
articles were brought, but often extorted from the king 
a promise that he would give them the first bale of 
cloth, or double canoe, he might receive. At times they 
went beyond this; and when a chief, who considered 
the king under obligations to him, knew that the inha¬ 
bitants of a district were preparing a present for their 
sovereign, which would include any articles he wished 
to possess, he would go to the king, and tapao, mark 
or bespeak it, even before it was finished. A promise 
given under these circumstances was usually regarded as 
binding, though it often involved the king in the greatest 
difficulties, and kept him necessitous. 
In the estimation of the people, one of the greatest 
virtues and highest excellencies of a king, was generosity; 
and one of the most unpopular dispositions he could 
cherish, was illiberality. In describing a good chief, or 
governor, they always spoke of him as one who distri¬ 
buted among his chiefs whatever he received, and never 
refused any thing for which they asked. 
Notwithstanding this generosity on the part of the 
king, the conduct of the government was often most 
rapacious and unjust. The stated and regular supplies 
furnished by the inhabitants, were often inadequate to 
the maintenance of the numbers^ who, attaching them¬ 
selves to the king’s household, passed their time in idle¬ 
ness, and were fed at his table. Whenever there was 
