Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/128

62 of which he had escaped." (He had actually escaped from Botany Bay.) "The people then began to treat Morgan with every species of insult, so that his life was very uncomfortable, and often in great danger. Morgan in his turn told the chiefs who they were; viz. that they were men sent out by the king of England to bring a pestilence upon the people of Tonga, and that they accordingly shut themselves up in this house, to perform witchcraft, and make incantations, which was the cause of the pestilence that then raged:" (there was an epidemic disease at the time, which was very fatal among the chiefs, two or three dying every day) "and that all their books were books of witchcraft. The chiefs began to take Morgan's statement into serious consideration; there certainly was a great mortality among them: the white men often assembled, and sang very loud; besides which, they would not let the Tonga people be present; and to prevent them even from peeping through the crevices of the reed fencing of the house, they stopt them up with all kinds of filth, knowing that the cleanliness of the Tonga people would not then allow them even to approach. And the chiefs said to themselves, if these people are doing no harm, why do not they allow us to be present? we do