450 
POLYNESfAN RESEARCHES. 
they can derive a supply. In order to afford them an 
opportunity of procuring this, and at the same time 
securing to the proprietors their right to the disposal of 
the fruit growing on their own lands, the twenty-fifth 
regulation was framed, and applied to most of the trees 
whose fruit is used as an article of food. 
The government having been hitherto an arbitrary 
monarchy, the king and chiefs had been accustomed, not 
only to receive a regular supply of all the articles pro¬ 
duced in the islands, but to send their servants to take 
whatever they required, however abundant the supply 
furnished might have been. This practice destroyed all 
security of individual property, and, so long as it con¬ 
tinued, was one of the great barriers to the improvement 
and civilization of the people. It had always appeared 
to us desirable to introduce such regulations, in reference 
to this subject, as would procure for the king and chiefs 
a revenue more ample than the system of extortion and 
plunder had ever furnished, and at the same time secure 
inviolate to the people the right of private property. 
In proposing any regulation of this kind to the chiefs, 
we always felt some degree of delicacy, and found the 
introduction of the measure attended with difficulties. 
To the chiefs it appeared in some degree depriving them 
of their power, and rendering them dependent on the 
donations of the people; and there were others who, 
connecting the prosperity of the people with the con¬ 
tinuance of the monarchical government, were not free 
from apprehension lest the restraint imposed on the 
chiefs should diminish their influence in the nation, and 
destroy the authority of the sovereign. The rulers and 
chiefs of Huahine, however, readily embraced the plan, and 
heartily recommending it to the adoption of the people, have 
