could hardly conceive how these islanders, wholly unacquainted with any
mechanical power, could raise such stupendous figures, and afterwards place
the large cylindric stones before mentioned upon their heads. The only
method I can conceive, is by raising the upper end by little and little,
supporting it by stones as it is raised, and building about it till they
got it erect; thus a sort of mount or scaffolding would be made, upon which
they might roll the cylinder, and place it upon the head of the statue, and
then the stones might be removed from about it. But if the stones are
factitious, the statues might have been put together on the place, in their
present position, and the cylinder put on by building a mount round them,
as above mentioned. But, let them have been made and set up by this or any
other method, they must have been a work of immense time, and sufficiently
shew the ingenuity and perseverance of these islanders in the age in which
they were built; for the present inhabitants have most certainly had no
hand in them, as they do not even repair the foundations of those which are
going to decay. They give different names to them, such as Gotomoara,
Marapate, Kanaro, Goway-too-goo, Matta Matta, &c. &c. to which they
sometimes prefix the word Moi, and sometimes annex Areeke. The latter
signifies chief, and the former burying, or sleeping-place, as well as we
could understand.[4]

Besides the monuments of antiquity, which were pretty numerous, and no
where but on or near the sea-coast, there were many little heaps of stones,
piled up in different places along the coast. Two or three of the uppermost
stones in each pile were generally white, perhaps always so, when the pile
is complete. It will hardly be doubted that these piles of stone had a
meaning; probably they might mark the place where people had been buried,
and serve instead of the large statues.

The working-tools of these people are but very mean, and, like those of all
the other islanders we have visited in this ocean, made of stone, bone,
shells, &c. They set but little value on iron or iron tools, which is the
more extraordinary, as they know their use; but the reason may be, their
having but little occasion for them.

[1] "It was impossible for us to guess at the cause of this
disproportion in the number of the different sexes; but as all the
women we saw were very liberal of their favours, I conjectured at that
time, that the