Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/19

Rh. He spoke to me of the capture of the vessel he sailed in: of the siege and reduction of the Tonga great fortress: of the effects of the great guns: of the panic and consternation thence produced: of their religious and political convocations, &c. &c., which are events so exactly detailed and portrayed in the work you have given, that I find not the least difference between the one and the other, save that the accounts given by Mr. Mariner are more amplified, and better arranged in bearing reference to the religious and political proceedings relating to their society."

That no source of information or of satisfactory proof might be left untried, I engaged Jeremiah Higgins to come up to town, and now it was, for the first time, that he and Mr. Mariner met, since their separation at the Tonga islands. He remained with me till the latter end of December, and I had abundant reason to be satisfied with the accordance between his several statements, extracted from him by various questions, and those which I had