EPIDEMIC INFLUENZA. 
35 
do the same ; and soon after the annual meetings 
in May, they so far complied as to render it unne¬ 
cessary for us to visit these stations. 
One spacious chapel was opened in the latter 
end of April, on which occasion I read a transla¬ 
tion of the sixth chapter of the second book of 
Chronicles, and afterwards preached from the sixth 
verse. Our Missionary meeting was remarkably 
well attended, and the subscriptions proportion ably 
liberal; they amounted to between three and four 
thousand gallons of oil, besides cotton, and other 
trifling articles. 
In the midst of this delightful state of things, 
the stations were visited with a distressing epide¬ 
mic, which spread through the whole group of 
islands, and proved fatal to many of the people. 
It was a kind of influenza, affecting the lungs and 
throat; many attacked with it lost their voice. We 
suffered in common with the people, and I was 
obliged to relinquish all public duty for some 
weeks. This kind of calamity has been frequently 
experienced in the islands since they have been 
the resort of foreign shipping, though we are not 
aware that it prevailed before. A kind of dysen¬ 
tery appeared after the visit of Vancouver’s ship, 
which called at the islands in 1790 : this proved 
fatal to a vast portion of the population. In the 
year 1800, the Britannia, a London vessel, an¬ 
chored at Taiarabu. Two seamen absconded, and 
a disease followed, less fatal, but very distress¬ 
ing, and more extensive, as scarcely an individual 
escaped. 
These diseases have generally passed through 
the islands from the east to the west, in the direc¬ 
tion of the trade winds. After the above ap¬ 
peared among the people, it was for some months 
d 2 
