Questions Which Were Daily Put To Me By Many Of These Islanders.
My
Otaheitean youth's leaving me proved of no consequence, as many young men
of this island voluntarily offered to come away with us.
I thought proper
to take on board one, who was about seventeen or eighteen years of age,
named Oedidee, a native of Bolabola, and a near relation of the great
Opoony, chief of that island. Soon after we were out of the harbour, and
had made sail, we observed a canoe following us, conducted by two men;
whereupon I brought-to, and they presently came alongside, having brought
me a present of roasted fruit and roots from Oreo. I made them a proper
return before I dismissed them, and then set sail to the west, with the
Adventure in company.
[1] "The accounts of the situation and distances of these isles, were
so various and so vague, that we could by no means depend upon them,
for we never met with any man who had visited them; however, they
served to convince us, that the natives of the Society Isles have
sometimes extended their navigation farther than its present limits,
by the knowledge they have of several adjacent countries. Tupaya
(Tupia), the famous man who embarked at Taheitee in the Endeavour, had
enumerated a much more considerable list of names, and had actually
drawn a map of their respective situations and magnitudes, of which
Lieutenant Pickersgill obligingly communicated a copy to me. In this
map we found all the names now mentioned, except two; but if his
drawing had been exact, our ships must have sailed over a number of
the islands which he had laid down.
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