Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/57

Rh Cava), which he never saw employed but as a medicine to prevent corpulency, ardent spirits being adopted as a luxury instead of it. Mr. Mariner, when he was at Wahoo, saw it drunk twice as a luxury, and was told that several of the old men still preferred it to spirits. It must be remembered that this was four years before Mr. Campbell's time.

P. 188. It is here remarked that the women are much disposed to break the taboo: the author says, "I have known them eat of the forbidden delicacies of pork and shark's flesh. What would be the consequence of a discovery I know not." Mr. Mariner also witnessed several instances of this. The Sandwich-island women have so many severe and impolitic restrictions with regard to food, that it would be unreasonable perhaps to expect that they should on all secure occasions be very faithfully strict: the punishment for such offences, however, is death. It is very well worth while to compare the state of the women in the Sandwich islands with that of the women of Tonga: it will afford an