lanted boughs I have mentioned were rifled by the throng of the
fruit they certainly had never borne before. Calabashes of poee-poee were
continually being replenished from the extensive receptacle in which that
article was stored, and multitudes of little fires were kindled about the
Ti for the purpose of roasting the bread-fruit.

Within the building itself was presented a most extraordinary scene. The
immense lounge of mats lying between the parallel rows of the trunks of
cocoa-nut trees, and extending the entire length of the house, at least
two hundred feet, was covered by the reclining forms of a host of chiefs
and warriors, who were eating at a great rate, or soothing the cares of
Polynesian life in the sedative fumes of tobacco. The smoke was inhaled
from large pipes, the bowls of which, made out of small cocoa-nut shells,
were curiously carved in strange heathenish devices. These were passed
from mouth to mouth by the recumbent smokers, each of whom, taking two or
three prodigious whiffs, handed the pipe to his neighbour; sometimes for
that purpose stretching indolently across the body of some dozing
individual whose exertions at the dinner-table had already induced sleep.

The tobacco used among the Typees was of a very mild and pleasing flavour,
and as I always saw it in leaves, and the natives appeared pretty well
supplied with it, I was led to believe that it must have been the growth
of the valley. Indeed Kory-Kory gave me to understand that this was the
case; but I never saw a single plant growing on the island. At Nukuheva,
and I believe, in all the other valleys, the weed is very scarce, being
only obtained in small quantities from foreigners, and smoking is
consequently with the inhabitants of these places a very great luxury. How
it was that the Typees were so well furnished with it I cannot divine. I
should think them too indolent to devote any attention to its culture;
and, indeed, as far as my observation extended not a single atom of the
soil was under any other cultivation than that of shower and sunshine. The
tobacco-plant, however, like the sugar-cane, may grow wild in some remote
part of the vale.

There were many in the Ti for whom the tobacco did not furnish a
sufficient stimulus, and who accordingly had recourse to "arva," as a more
powerful agent in producing the desired effect.

"Arva" is a root very generally dispersed over the South Seas, and from it
is extracted a juice, the effects