other in lifting them over any dirt or water in the way.

On approaching the first house, they saw the people arrange themselves
on either side of a long mat spread on the ground, at the farther end of
which sat some young girls and very pretty children, dressed with the
greatest neatness and taste, who kept their position, evidently
expecting the strangers to come up and make them presents. At one
house, at the end of a mat thirty feet long, sat a girl about six years
old; her dress was red, and a large quantity of plaited hair was wound
round her head. She was leaning on the arm of a good-looking woman,
supposed to be her nurse. The gentlemen walked up to her, and as soon
as they approached she stretched out her hands for the beads which they
offered, and received them with a grace which no princess in Europe
could have surpassed. The people, in consequence of these gifts, seemed
to be so pleased with their visitors that they employed every means in
their power to amuse them. The master of one of the houses where they
stopped ordered a dance to be performed before them, different from any
they had yet witnessed. It was executed by one man, who put on a high
head-dress of feathers, edged round with sharks' teeth. As he moved
slowly round he made it describe a circle, bringing it often close to
the faces of the spectators so as to make them start back, always to the
great amusement of the rest.

In the course of their walk the next day they met a company of dancers--
two women and six men, with three drums--who were making a tour of the
island for their own amusement, for they received no pay, and were said
by Tupia to be among the principal people of the country. The women
wore graceful head-dresses of long braids of hair and flowers. The
upper parts of their bodies were without clothing; but they were amply
clothed from the breast downwards in black, and they wore pearls in
their ears. The dances were of the immoral kind general in the islands.
Regular dramas were also represented before the strangers.

It appeared that the island had lately been conquered by the subjects of
Opoony, King of Bolabola, whose acquaintance Captain Cook wished to
make. Instead of seeing a fine-looking warrior as he had expected, he
found a withered, decrepit wretch, half blind with age; yet it seemed
that he was the terror of all the surrounding islands.

A good supply of hogs, poultry, and other provisions having been
obtain