Other Accounts ...
Endeavour Voyage Maps
James Cook's Journal Ms 1, National Library of Australia
Transcript of Cook's Journal
Joseph Banks's Journal
Sydney Parkinson's Journal
Description of the Island, its Produce and Inhabitants
Index
Search
Contact us
The face of the country, except that part of it which borders upon the sea, is very uneven; it rises in ridges that run up into the middle of the island, and there form mountains, which may be seen at the distance of sixty miles: between the foot of these ridges and the sea, is a border of low land, surrounding the whole island, except in a few places where the ridges rise directly from the sea: the border of low land is in different parts of different breadths, but no where more than a mile and a half. The soil, except upon the very tops of the ridges, is extremely rich and fertile, watered by a great number of rivulets of excellent water, and covered with fruit trees of various kinds, some of which are of a stately growth and thick foliage, so as to form one continued wood; and even the tops of the ridges, though in general they are bare, and burnt up by the sun, are, in some parts, not without their produce.
The low land that lies between the foot of the ridges and the sea, and some of the vallies, are the only parts of the island that are inhabited, and here it is populous; the houses do not form villages or towns, but are ranged along the whole border at the distance of about fifty yards from each other, with little plantations of plantains, the tree which furnishes them with cloth. The whole island, according to Tupia’s account, who certainly knew, could furnish six thousand seven hundred and eighty fighting men, from which the number of inhabitants may easily be computed.
 |
Voyaging Accounts |  |
© Derived from Vols. II-III of the London 1773 edition: National Library of Australia call no. FERG 7243, page 185, 2004
Published by kind permission of the Library
To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/hv23/188.html