Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/359

Rh THE TON(?A I3I.ANDS. 293 and sometimes, on the contrary, with a pro- fuse perspiration. Here also they plait flowers which they have gathered at Matawto, (about a mile farther along the beach,) whiph thp women put round their necks or take home to the moo a, and present tp their lovers or their friends, or to superior chiefs. The following song is very often sung by them, or, to speak perhaps more correctly, is given in a sort of recitative by either sex j and in the Tonga language has neither rhymes nor regular measure, although some of their songs h^vp both, It is perhaps a curious circum- stance that love and war seldom form the sub- jects of their poetical compositions, but mostly scenery and moral reflections. SONG. ^Vhilst we were talking of Vavdoo tooa Ljcoo, the women sd4 to us, let us repair to the back of the island to contem- plate the setting sun : there let us listen to the warbling of tjie birds and the cooing of the wood- pigeon. We will ga- . t^er flowers from the burying-place at Matawto, and partake of refreshments prepared for us at Licoo One: we will then bathe in the sea, and rinse ourselves in the Vdoo A'ca; we will anoint our skins in the sun with sweet scented oil, and will plait in wreaths the flowers gathered at Matdivto. And now as we stand motionless on the eminence over ^no MdnoOy the whistling of the wind among the branches of the lofty toa shall fill us with a pleasing melancholy ; or our minds shall be seized with astonishment as we behold the roaring surf below, endeavouring but in vain to tear away the firm rocks.