Page:Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks.djvu/184

126 themselves against such weapons as their own by mats folded and laid upon their breasts under their clothes.

Of the few things we saw among the people, every one was ornamented in a manner infinitely superior to anything we had hitherto seen. Their cloth was of a better colour, as well as nicely painted; their clubs were better cut and polished; the canoe which we saw, though very small and narrow, was nevertheless very highly carved and ornamented. One thing particularly in her seemed to be calculated rather as an ornament for something that was never intended to go into the water, and that was two lines of small white feathers placed on the outside of the canoe, and which were, when we saw them, thoroughly wet with the water.

We have now seen seventeen islands in these seas, and have landed on five of the most important; of these the language, manners, and customs agreed most exactly. I should therefore be tempted to conclude that those islands which we have not seen do not differ materially at least from the others. The account I shall give of them is taken chiefly from Otahite, where I was well acquainted with their policy, as I found them to be a people so free from deceit that I trusted myself among them almost as freely as I could do in my own country, sleeping continually in their houses in the woods without so much as a single companion. Whether or not I am right in judging their manners and customs to be general among these seas, any one who gives himself the trouble of reading this journal through can judge as well as I myself.