e enjoyed; and there were guest-houses for the
reception of visitors, or for the accommodation of the people of a whole
district. Some were two hundred feet long, thirty broad, and twenty
high under the ridge; on one side of them was an area enclosed with low
palings. They were maintained at the public expense.

The style of cookery among these islanders has already been described.
They baked in their earth-ovens hogs and large fish, as also the
bread-fruit. The baked pork and fish were considered more juicy and
more equally done than by any mode of cooking known at home. Of the
bread-fruit they made various dishes, by putting to it either water or
the milk of the cocoanut, and then beating it to a paste with a stone
pestle, and afterwards mixing it with ripe plantains and bananas. They
made an intoxicating beverage from a plant they called _Ava_. The
chiefs only indulged in the vice of drinking to excess, and even they
considered it a disgrace to be seen intoxicated. They sometimes drank
together, and vied with each other in taking the greatest number of
draughts, each draught being about a pint. They ate a prodigious
quantity of food at each meal, and would finish off by swallowing a
quart of pounded bread-fruit of the consistency of custard.

They had various amusements, and were especially fond of dancing, in
which they kept admirable time, their movements being often graceful;
but their gestures too generally showed the very debased condition of
their morals. Their musical instruments were flutes and drums. The
flutes were made of hollow bamboo, about a foot long. The drums were
blocks of wood of cylindrical form, solid at one end, but scooped out
and covered at the other with shark's skin. They were beaten by the
hands instead of sticks. The natives sang to these instruments, and
often made extempore verses.

The men delighted especially in wrestling. They also practised archery
and spear-throwing. They shot, not at a mark, but to try how far they
could send an arrow; their spears, however, they threw at a mark,
generally the bole of a plantain, at the distance of twenty yards.
These spears were about nine feet long. They also, in war, used clubs
of hard wood, often well carved, and six or seven feet long; pikes,
headed with the stings of sting-rays; and slings, which they wielded
with great dexterity. Thus armed, they fought with obstinacy and fury,
and gave no quarter to man, woman, or child w