Character and Manners of the Natives at Otaheite
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value of them too well not to stipulate for a consideration: the price, indeed, was not great, yet it was such as our men were not always able to pay, and under this temptation they stole nails and other iron from the ship. The nails that we brought for traffick, were not always in their reach, and therefore they drew several out of different parts of the vessel, particularly those that fastened the cleats to the ship’s side. This was productive of a double mischief; damage to the ship, and a considerable rise at market. When the gunner offered, as usual, small nails for hogs of a middling size, the natives refused to take them, and produced large spikes, intimating that they expected such nails as these. A most diligent enquiry was set on foot to discover the offenders, but all to no purpose; and though a large reward was offered to procure intelligence, none was obtained. I was mortified at the disappointment, but I was still more mortified at a fraud which I found some of our people had practised upon the natives. When no nails were to be procured, they had stolen lead, and cut it up in the shape of nails. Many of the natives who had been paid with this base money, brought their leaden nails, with great simplicity, to the gunner, and requested him to give them iron in their stead. With this request, however reasonable, he could not comply; because, by rendering lead current, it would have encouraged the stealing it, and the market would have been as effectually spoiled by those who could not procure nails, as by those who could; it was therefore necessary, upon every account, to render this leaden currency of no value, though for our honour I should have been glad to have called it in.
On Tuesday the 7th, I sent one of the mates, with thirty men, to a village at a little distance from the market, hoping
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Voyaging Accounts |  |
© Derived from Volume I of the London 1773 Edition: National Library of Australia call no. FERG 7243, page 459, 2004
Published by kind permission of the Library
To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/hv01/459.html