s asserted that Norton was killed by a
carpenter for the sake of an axe which he was carrying; that his body was
stripped and dragged some distance inland to a _Malae_ where it lay
exposed for three days before burial; and that the grass had never since
grown upon the track of the body nor upon its resting-place on the
_Malae_. Mariner found a bare track leading inland from the beach and
terminating in a bare patch, lying transversely, about the length and
breadth of a man. It did not appear to be a beaten path, nor were there
people enough in the neighbourhood to make such a path. Probably it was
an old track, long disused and forgotten, for by such natural causes is
man's belief in the supernatural fed.

[55-1] The Vavau Group, called by the natives Haafuluhao, which then as
now, owed spiritual allegiance to Tonga.

[55-2] Manua, the most Easterly of the Samoa Group, called Opoun by La
Perouse.

[55-3] Tutuila, discovered by Roggewein in 1721, visited by Bougainville
4th May, 1768, and by La Perouse 10th December, 1787. On the day before
his murder by the natives, Comte de Langle, La Perouse's second in
command, discovered Pangopango harbour while on a walk through the
island, but neither Bougainville nor La Perouse seems to have discerned
the masked fissure in the cliff which forms its entrance. Edwards must
have had a copy of Bougainville on board, but no record of La Perouse's
visit four years before, or he would have shown greater caution in
communicating with the natives. That he had heard something of La
Perouse's voyage, and had some ground for suspicion is shown by Hamilton.
A detailed account of de Langle's murder is to be found in "La Perouse's
Voyage," vol. ii.

[56-1] Vavau.

[57-1] He might have added "in the Pacific," for it is a magnificent
land-locked harbour, a little narrow for sailing ships to beat out of in
a southerly wind, but excellent for steamships.

[57-2] This was Finau Ulukalala, one of the most notable men in Tongan
history. He had just succeeded his elder brother, the Finau (Feenow) of
Captain Cook's visit in 1777. On April 21st, 1799, he conspired against
Tukuaho, the temporal sovereign of Tonga and assassinated him, plunging
Tonga into a civil anarchy which lasted twenty years. He was Mariner's
patron and protector until his death in 1809. "The great master of Greek
drama," says a writer in the "Quarterly Review," "could have desired no
better elements than are to be found in the