d that after the
cylinders had been formed they were rolled down the hill. There must
have been great difficulty in raising them to the heads of the statues.
It was conjectured that this was done by raising a mound round each
statue and rolling up the stone on it, the mound being afterwards
removed. It must have required a considerable amount of mechanical
knowledge to bring the statues from the quarry, and to place them
upright. The natives knew nothing whatever as to the origin of the
statues, nor did they look on them with any respect, nor, indeed, seem
interested in any way in them. No quadrupeds were seen on the island,
but few birds, and only two sorts of low shrubs.

The party were greatly inconvenienced in their walk by the attempts of
the natives to steal from them, and at length one man, who ran off with
a bagful of provisions, was fired upon with small shot and wounded
slightly. He dropped the bag, and seemed in no way offended at the
treatment he received. The people carried short clubs and also spears
with flint heads. The dress of the chiefs consisted of two pieces of
cloth, one round the waist and the other thrown over the shoulders; but
many were almost naked. The men wore their hair and beards short, with
a fillet ornamented with feathers round the head; while the women wore
the hair long, and had straw caps, shaped like a Scotch bonnet, on their
heads. Their habitations were low huts, built with sticks bent
overhead, and joined together so as to form an arch. The longest seen
was sixty feet long, and only four or five wide. Their canoes were very
poor, owing to the want of materials, and very few were seen. Captain
Cook considered that there were about six or seven hundred inhabitants
on the island. In colour, features, and language they were similar to
the inhabitants of the islands to the west, so that it was evident they
had sprung from the same race.

The Resolution left Easter Island on March 16, and stood
north-west-by-north, and north-north-west, for the Marquesas, with a
fine easterly gale. Having reached the latitude of the group, the
course was changed to west. On April 5 first one island and then others
in succession were seen; and the explorers were satisfied that they had
reached the Marquesas, discovered by the Spaniards in 1595. The first
island seen was called Hood's Island, after the midshipman who
discovered it, and the others were Saint Pedro, Dominica, and Saint
Ch