Character and Manners of the Natives at Otaheite
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but did not seem willing to part with any of the provisions which our people were most desirous to purchase: they gave them, however, a few cocoa-nuts and plantains, and at length sold them nine hogs and a few fowls. The Lieutenant was of opinion, that they might be brought to trade freely by degrees, but the distance from the ship was so great, that too many men would be necessary, for a guard. He saw a great number of very large canoes upon the beach, and some that were building. He observed that all their tools were made of stone, shells, and bone, and very justly inferred, that they had no metal of any kind. He found no quadrupeds among them, besides hogs and dogs, nor any earthen vessel, so that all their food is either baked or roasted. Having no vessel in which water could be subjected to the action of fire, they had no more idea that it could be made hot, than that it could be made solid. As the queen was one morning at breakfast with us on board the ship, one of her attendants, a man of some note, and one of those that we thought were priests, saw the Surgeon fill the teapot by turning the cock of an urn that stood upon the table: having remarked this with great curiosity and attention, he presently turned the cock, and received the water upon his hand: as soon as he felt himself scalded, he roared out, and began to dance about the cabbin with the most extravagant and ridiculous expressions of pain and astonishment: the other Indians, not being able to conceive what was the matter with him, stood staring at him in amaze, and not without some mixture of terror. The Surgeon, however, who had innocently been the cause of the mischief, applied a remedy, though it was some time before the poor fellow was easy.
On Thursday the I6th, Mr. Furneaux, my Second Lieutenant, was taken very ill, which distressed me greatly, as
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Voyaging Accounts |  |
© Derived from Volume I of the London 1773 Edition: National Library of Australia call no. FERG 7243, page 466, 2004
Published by kind permission of the Library
To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/hv01/466.html