150 
POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
spear in the other, ready to strike as soon as the 
fish appears. 
In the rivers they also fish by torch-light, espe¬ 
cially for eels ; and though the circumstances are 
varied, the impression is not inferior. Few scenes 
present a more striking and singular effect than a 
band of natives walking along the shallow parts of 
the rocky sides of a river, elevating a torch with 
one hand, and a spear in the other ; while the glare 
of their torches is thrown upon the overhanging 
boughs, and reflected from the agitated surface of 
the stream. Their own bronze-coloured and lightly 
clothed forms, partially illuminated, standing like 
figures in relief; while the whole scene appears 
in bright contrast with the dark and almost mid¬ 
night gloom that envelops every other object. 
Since their intercourse with Europeans, English- 
made steel hooks have been introduced. They 
like their sharpness at the point, but usually com¬ 
plain of them as too open or wide. For some 
kinds of fish they are preferred, but for most 
they find the mother-of-pearl hooks answer best. 
Every fisherman, I believe, would rather have a 
wrought-iron nail three or four inches long, or a 
piece of iron-wire of the size, and make a hook 
according to his own mind, than have the best 
European-made hook that could be given to him. 
Most of the nails which they formerly procured from 
the shipping were used for this purpose, and highly 
prized. 
Their ideas of the nature of these valuable 
articles were very singular. Perceiving, in their 
shape and colour, a resemblance to the young 
shoots or scions that grow from the roots of the 
bread-fruit trees, they imagined that they were a 
hard kind of plant, and procured in the same way. 
