Then Sitting Down With Some White Man Or Some Native Who
Can Be A Little Understood, And Collecting The History Of Those
Islands, Of Tamaahmaah's Wars, The Curiosities Of The Islands,
&C., Preparatory To The Histories Of Their Voyages; And The
Collection Is Indeed Ridiculously Contemptible.
To enumerate the
thousand instances of ignorance, filth, &c., - or to
particularize all the frantic gambols that are daily practiced,
would require Volumes.
Before embarking, the great eris of the American Fur Company took
leave of their illustrious ally in due style, with many
professions of lasting friendship and promises of future
intercourse; while the matter-of-fact captain anathematized him
in his heart for a grasping, trafficking savage; as shrewd and
sordid in his dealings as a white man. As one of the vessels of
the company will, in the course of events, have to appeal to the
justice and magnanimity of this island potentate, we shall see
how far the honest captain was right in his opinion.
* It appears, from the accounts of subsequent voyagers, that
Tamaahmaah afterwards succeeded in his wish of purchasing a large
ship. In this he sent a cargo of sandal-wood to Canton, having
discovered that the foreign merchants trading with him made large
profits on this wood, shipped by them from the islands to the
Chinese markets. The ship was manned by natives, but the officers
were Englishmen. She accomplished her voyage, and returned in
safety to the islands, with the Hawaiian flag floating gloriously
in the breeze.
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