SITUATION OF THE ISLANDS. 7 
which, through a slight mistake that a foreigner 
might easily make, he called Otaheite. Bougain¬ 
ville, manifesting in this respect a nicer discrimina¬ 
tion of sound, rejected the 0, which is no part of 
the name, and called it Taiti; he however omitted 
the aspirate. By the natives their island is called 
Ta-hi-ti. The i having the sound of e in their lan¬ 
guage, it is pronounced as if written in English 
Ta-he-te. Captain Cook visited several parts o^ 
Tahiti, and the neighbouring islands ; and, in ho¬ 
nour of his majesty George III. by whom the 
expedition had been sent, he designated the cluster 
of which Tahiti is the principal, The Georgian 
Islands : another cluster, which he discovered 
about 70 miles to the westward, he called The 
Society Islands, in honour of the Royal Society, 
at whose recommendation the expedition had been 
appointed. The Georgian Isles include Tahiti, 
Eimeo, Tabuaemanu or Sir Charles Sanders’ Island, 
Tetu u oa, Matea, and Meetia. The Society Islands 
include Huahine, Raiatea, Tahaa, Borabora, Mau- 
rua, Tubai, Moupiha or Lord Howe’s Island, and 
Fenuaura or Scilly Islands; with the small islets 
surrounding them. 
The two clusters extend from 16 to 18 degrees 
S. lat. and from 149 to 155 degrees W. long, and 
are often included by geographical writers, among 
others by M. Malte Brim, under the general desig¬ 
nation of the Society Islands.* As the islands 
are politically as well as geographically distinct, 
I have retained the designations given by Captain 
Cook, occasionally exchanging them for the terms 
Windward and Leeward Islands, which are fre¬ 
quently used by those residing and trading among 
them. 
System of Geography, vol. iii. p. G30. 
