“dead with pain and hunger!"—was unbound, and permitted to go on shore, without any remuneration for the indignity and misery he had suffered, or pay for the hogs received.

The Frenchman gained his object. But what was the consequence? The next morning, a boat from the ship with an armed crew, approached the shore for water. Not perceiving any natives, they came carelessly to the beach, and were just preparing to land, when a volley of musketry was poured among them from the nearest thicket; and one man fell dead in the surf, while two others were so severly wounded, that the boat barely made an escape to the ship. The captain thought it prudent, no doubt from the disabled state of his crew, to weigh anchor and make sail immediately, and thus avoided further peril to himself; but only after having been directly accessary to the murder of one of his own men, and having insured, as it were, the utter massacre of any hapless crew of his countrymen, who, unsuspicious of just ground for fear, might commit themselves, or be unavoidably subjected by accident or distress, to the power of those thus wantonly rendered implacable enemies.

I fully believe this to be only one of a thousand instances of oppression, insult, and cruelty of a similar or far more infamous character, which would form a part of the true history of the intercourse of civilized man with the islanders of the Pacific, could it be laid before the world. Besides all that I have myself known and heard on this point, there is enough on record, furnished by various voyagers, to confirm me in the opinion. And it is in such aggression and barbarity, on the part of civilized and nominally Christian men, that more than half the reputed savageness of

270

ILL CONDUCT OF VISITORS.

the heathen world has its origin. The white flag of France is far from being the only one thus stained. Nor can the charge be confined to the comparative insignificance of a petty trader. Ships ploughing the sea for purposes of discovery and science, and even the stately bulwarks of Britain and America, sent forth to sweep the surface of the ocean in search of piracy, and outlaws, and every injustice and oppression, must share in the opprobrium; for there have been commanders, who, in place of pursuing the kind and Christian policy of a Byron of the Blonde, and a Jones of the Peacock, in their intercourse with the Polynesians, have deported themselves, in some instances at least, in a manner to shroud the stripes of America in reproach, and to tinge the proud banner of Britain with a double die.

But the facts on which this assertion rests seldom reach the public ear or meet the public eye, unless it be in a version somewhat similar to that, which we may rightly suppose the Frenchman in the case above related, to have given of the circumstance-communicated to us with all the freshness and feeling of just indignation on his arrival at some one of his native ports. "The ship commanded by has just entered our harbor, from a long voyage in the Pacific ocean. She has been peculiarly unfortunate in the loss of several of her crew at the Washington Islands, where she touched at Nukuhiva for refreshments. The islanders, it appears, are a very treacherous and ferocious people. A boat sent on shore for water was suddenly attacked by a party in ambush, and unhappily one of the crew perished; and the rest barely made their escape after being severely wounded!"

Taua-hania, whom Morrison, in his interpretations,

styles "Chief of the Gods," related the particulars of the same outrage to Captain Finch, the day he made a visit to the valley.

On boarding the Vincennes, after having dispatched the old chieftain, according to his urgent request, to the shore, we learned the new comer to be "The Duchess de Berri," Captain Moeté, from Callao, five days later than ourselves, bound to Manilla.

Captain Finch, though daily importuned by the chiefs and warriors for muskets and powder, with offers of any quantity of hogs in return, has utterly refused to comply with their wishes in this respect : fully explaining the reasons of his determination, by pointing out the evils that result to themselves from their violence and wars. Desirous that the commander of the Duchess de Berri should adopt the same policy in this respect, he early sought an interview with him, and informed him of the course he himself had pursued, and his wish that he would follow the example. Ascertaining that muskets, ammunition, and brandy, were the only articles on board the ship which Captain Moeté could offer in return for the wood and water he needed, Captain Finch immediately supplied him with coarse cottons and implements of iron sufficient for the exchange, and engaged to have both wood and water transported from the shore for him, by the boats and men of the Vincennes. He also gave information to Captain Moeté, who appears to be an intelligent and respectable gentleman, of the ill conduct of his countryman of which the Taua had complained; and he seemed fully to perceive the hazard to which he might have been exposed in consequence of it, had his visit been made at a time when there was no other vessel in the

272

COUNCIL WITH THE CHIEFS.

harbor, and he unaware of any inciting cause to treachery and vengeance on the part of the islanders.

I have not been on shore to-day, but have occupied myself principally in taking a panoramic drawing of the harbor and valley as viewed from our anchorage, and in sketching the tatau on the figure of Te Ipu, a chief warrior of this tribe. Captain Finch has held a long and interesting conference with the chiefs, priests, and warriors: dissuading them from the prosecution of war with their neighboring tribes, and pointing out to them the advantages and blessings which would arise to themselves from living in peace with each other, and in promoting the best interest of the whole, by considering themselves as one and the same people, bound in an alliance offensive and defensive against enemies and invaders from abroad only.

The wars among them are various in their character as well as causes. There are those which are strictly civil, in which different parties in the same tribe constitute the only combatants: as in cases in which different members of the family entitled hereditarily to the chieftainship attempt to secure it to themselves, and accordingly enlist separate bodies of adherents. In such instances the usual issue is the entire extermination of one of the parties. A war sometimes takes place between two tribes usually in alliance with each other against a common enemy: as that which recently resulted in the devastation of the valley of the Teiis, at which we now are, by the Hapas. But in all wars with the Taipiis-such as that now existing-the Hapas and Teiis are allies, as we find them to be. At times several tribes have combined in the utter extermination of a single weaker though independent body. At others again, all the

WAR AND ITS CAUSES.

273

tribes become nearly equally divided in a general contest. And again, all are sometimes united in a war against another island or islands.

The causes of their wars are equally various. Sometimes they arise from a petty theft, or an insult or injury offered to an individual, in the resentment of which the whole power of the tribe to which he belongs is called into action. Not unfrequently a friendly party visiting a neighboring tribe becomes unintentionally embroiled; and the result is fierce contests between the two tribes-though the individuals first injured or killed may themselves have been greatly the aggressors. Motives of mere ambition, a determination in one chief to possess himself of the property and possessions of another, often leads to this result; but the most common cause is the seizure of the inhabitants of one valley by those of another, for the purpose of immolation to their gods.

In addition to the stealing of a war-conch from the Hapas, this last is the occasion of the present war between the Teiis and Taipiis. Only a short time since, a party of Taipiis stole into the bay in which we are at anchor, at the dead of night, and, creeping guardedly into a house near the beach whose inmates, seven in number, three men, three women, and a child-were wrapped in unconscious sleep, seized and overpowered them, and bore them off in triumph, to be sacrificed to the manes of a distinguished chief, before any alarm could be communicated to their neighbors. Urging this violence as a just cause for fighting, the chiefs and warriors now again pleaded with the captain to join with them in punishing their enemies, or at least to supply them with guns and powder for that purpose.