Detraction and calumny of foreign resi- XVII. Government debt, and state of commerce THE GEORGIAN AND SOCIETY ISLANDS. LETTER I. ARRIVAL AT TAHITI. Matavai Bay at Tahiti, A CLUSTER of low islands and coral reefs lies about midway, in a direct line, between the Washington and Georgian groups, rendering the navigation at that point somewhat intricate and dangerous. From a supposition, that we might be obliged to lie to at night, when in that vicinity, we did not expect to accomplish the passage from Nukuhiva to Tahiti, -a distance of seven hundred miles--in much less time than a week. In this, however, we were favorably disappointed. The trade wind proved unusually fine; and having made the first of the low islands early on the 14th instant-the second day from Taiohae-we succeeded in running by the whole chain the same evening, and, with an open sea before us, hastened on our course with unchecked speed. Five of the low islands-the Tikoas, the Palliser, and Elizabath island-were passed by us within two or three miles of their shores. Elevated a few feet only above the water, scarce in sight at a distance of six and eight miles, and but scantily tufted with groves of the cocoanut and pandanus, they present a strong contrast to the loftiness and magnificent THE LOW ISLANDS. scenery of the groups between which they lie. Though small-some fifteen or twenty miles only in circumference-they are inhabited: but the subsistence they afford is scanty and miserable, consisting almost exclusively, besides fish from the sea, of cocoanuts and the berry of the pandanus. Happily for the race dwelling upon them, though reduced in their outward circumstances almost to the condition of the brute, the rich blessing of the gospel has reached their desolate shores. Through the influence of native missionaries from Tahiti, they have, within a few years, forsaken their idols and embraced the religion of the cross-have learned to read-possess the scriptures in the Tahitian version -and daily pay their vows to God by hymns and prayer, in neat and humble chapels of their own. workmanship. On Saturday, the 15th instant, at twelve o'clock, we descried Matea, or the Island of Osnaburgh— having run some distance from our course to make it. Perceiving it to be only a lofty, volcanic rock, rising abruptly from the water in a truncated cone -once evidently a burning funnel-we did not approach nearer than twelve or fifteen miles; and bore away for Tahiti, the principal of the Georgian Islands, of which we gained an indistinct view, forty miles distant, at sunset the same evening. Having been under short sail during the night, we were yesterday morning still far from land; and it was ten o'clock before we were near enough to Point Venus to send a boat on shore, previously to bringing the ship to anchor. |