336 POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES* 
In proportion to the body, their limbs are small 
and weak, while their gait is awkward. Excepting 
in the neighbourhood of the chief towns, they were 
usually destitute of clothing, though armed with a 
spear or lance, with which, even at a great distance, 
they are fatal marksmen. They are represented as 
indolent, and cruel. Agriculture is unknown among 
them, although the indigenous preductions of the 
country yield them little if any subsistence. Their 
food is scanty, precarious, and loathsome, some¬ 
times consisting of grubs and reptiles taken in the 
hollow or decayed trees of the forest. Occasion¬ 
ally, however, they procure excellent fish from the 
sea, or the lakes, rivers, &c. Their dwellings are 
low huts of bark, which afford but a mere temporary 
shelter from the weather. 
They appear, in physical structure, and other 
respects, to resemble the inhabitants of Papua, or 
New Guinea, and of the interior of Sumatra, and 
other large islands of the Asiatic archipelago. 
They are a distinct people from the inhabitants of 
New Zealand or the South Sea Islands, altoge¬ 
ther inferior to them, and apparently the lowest 
grade of human kind. Their habits are fugitive 
and migratory, and this has perhaps greatly con¬ 
tributed to the failure of the benevolent attempts 
that have been made, by the government and 
others, to meliorate their condition, and elevate 
their character. The school for aboriginal chil¬ 
dren, under the patronage of the government, was 
a most interesting institution : I frequently visited 
it, and was surprised to learn that, though treated 
with every kindness, the young scholars, when an 
opportunity occurred, frequently left the school, 
and fled to their native woods, where every effort 
to discover their retreat, or to reclaim them, proved 
