tress, Tati, the principal chief of the
island, and his family, accompanied him. This chief had come to
Papeiti to be present at the fete of the 1st of May.

On the 4th of May we put off to sea in a boat, for the purpose of
coasting round to Papara, forty-two miles distant. I found the
chief Tati to be a lively old man nearly ninety years of age, who
remembered perfectly the second landing of the celebrated
circumnavigator of the globe, Captain Cook. His father was, at that
period, the principal chief, and had concluded a friendly alliance
with Cook, and, according to the custom then prevalent at Tahiti,
had changed names with him.

Tati enjoys from the French government a yearly pension of 6,000
francs (240 pounds), which, after his death, will fall to his eldest
son.

He had with him his young wife and five of his sons; the former was
twenty-three years old, and the ages of the latter varied from
twelve to eighteen. The children were all the offspring of other
marriages, this being his fifth wife.

As we had not left Papeiti till nearly noon, and as the sun sets
soon after six o'clock, and the passage between the numberless rocks
is highly dangerous, we landed at Paya (22 miles), where a sixth son
of Tati's ruled as chief.

The island is intersected in all directions by noble mountains, the
loftiest of which, the Oroena, is 6,200 feet high. In the middle of
the island the mountains separate, and a most remarkable mass of
rock raises itself from the midst of them. It has the form of a
diadem with a number of points, and it is to this circumstance that
it owes its name. Around the mountain range winds a forest girdle,
from four to six hundred paces broad; it is inhabited, and contains
the most delicious fruit. Nowhere did I ever eat such bread-fruit,
mangoes, oranges, and guavas, as I did here. As for cocoa-nuts, the
natives are so extravagant with them, that they generally merely
drink the water they contain, and then throw away the shell and the
fruit. In the mountains and ravines there are a great quantity of
plantains, a kind of banana, which are not commonly eaten, however,
without being roasted. The huts of the natives lie scattered here
and there along the shore; it is very seldom that a dozen of these
huts are seen together.

The bread-fruit is somewhat similar in shape to a water-melon, and
weighs from four to six pounds. The outside is green, and rather
rough and thin. The natives scrape