THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 
4*3 
had happened, they told ns the name of the Fnttafaihe who 177 
was thep. king, and of thofe who had fucceeded, down to t 
Ponlaho, who is the fifth fince that period; the firft being 
an old man, at the time of the arrival of the fhips. 
From what has been faid of the prefentking, it would be 
natural to fuppofe, that he had the higheft rank of any per- 
fon in the iflands. But, to our great furprize, we found it 
is not fo; for Latoolibooloo, the perfon who was pointed out 
to me as king, when I firft vifited Tongataboo, and three 
women, are, in fome refpedts, fuperior to Poulaho himfelf. 
On our inquiring, who thefe extraordinary perfonages were, 
whom they diftinguifh by the name and title of Tammaha *? 
we were told, that the late king, Poulaho’s father, had a 
filler of equal rank, and elder than himfelf; that fhe, by a 
man who came from the ifland of Feejee, had a fon and 
two daughters ; and that thefe three perfons, as well as 
their mother, rank above Futtafaihe the king. We endea¬ 
voured, in vain, to trace the reafon of this lingular pre¬ 
eminence of the c fanimahas\ for we could learn nothing 
befides this account of their pedigree. The mother, and 
one of the daughters, called Tooeela-kaipa, live at Vavaoo. 
Latoolibooloo, the fon, and the other daughter, whofe name 
is Moungoula-kaipa, refide at Tongataboo. The latter, is 
the woman who is mentioned to have dined with me on the 
2ifl of June. This gave occafion to our difcovering her fu- 
periority over the king, who would not eat in her prefence, 
though fhe made no fcruple to do fo before him, and re¬ 
ceived from him the cuftomary obeifance, by touching her 
foot. We never had an opportunity of feeing him pay this 
* The reader need not be reminded that Tamoha , which fignifies a Chief, in the dia¬ 
lect of Hamao, and Tammaha , become the fame word, by the change of a fingle letter, the 
articulation of which is not very ftrongly marked. 
mark 
