Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/134

106 a kind of stuff, but much inferior in beauty to that of the paper mulberry tree.

Some of the natives, who followed us very close, affected the appearance of having no other design, but that of being useful to us: yet we caught some of them now and then putting their hands into our pockets, to steal what they could find; and when we discovered them, we always obliged them to return what they had taken. One of them, however, having seized a knife, that belonged to one of the crew, took to his heels with all speed, and disappeared amid the wood.

It was not long before we fell in with a company of the islanders, who were preparing to drink kava. They invited us to sit down by them, and we remained all the time they were preparing their beverage. They give the same name to the species of pepper tree, which constitutes its chief ingredient, and the long, fleshy, and very tender roots of which are often more than four inches thick. These they first cleaned with the greatest care. They then chewed them, so as to reduce them to a kind of paste, of which they formed balls, nearly four inches in circumference. As fast as these balls were made, they were put into a large wooden vessel; and when the bottom was covered with them, standing about four inches