and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
THE MIRROR
OF
LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.
| VOL. XIX, NO. 537.] | SATURDAY, MARCH 10, 1832. | [PRICE 2d. |
POLYNESIAN ISLANDS.
Mr. George Bennett,1 whose "Journals" and "Researches" denote him tobe a shrewd and ingenious observer, has favoured us with the originalsketches of the above cuts. They represent three of the spots that studthe Southern Pacific Ocean. The first beams with lovely luxuriance inits wood-crowned heights; while the second and third rise from the bosomof the sea in frowning sterility[pg 146] amidst the gay ripple that ever andanon laves their sides, and plashes in the brilliancy of the sunbeam.
Tucopia, or Barwell's Island, has recently been elsewhere described byMr. Bennett.2 His sketch includes the S.W. side of the island, andhis entertaining description is as follows:
"This small but elevated and wooded island was discovered by theship Barwell in 1798; it was afterwards (1810) visited by the Frenchnavigators, who called it by the native name Tucopia. On the S.W. sideof the island is a wooded, picturesque valley, surrounded by loftymountains, and containing a small but well-inhabited village. Twosingularly isolated basaltic rocks, of some elevation, partially bare,but at parts covered by shrubs, rise from about the centre of thevalley. When close in, two canoes came off containing several natives,who readily came on board; two of them had been in an English whaler,(which ships occasionally touched at the island for provisions, &c.) andaddressed us in tolerable English. They were well formed, muscular men,with fine and expressive features, of the Asiatic race, in colour of alight copper; they wore the hair long, and stained of a light browncolour; they were tattooed only on the breast, which had been executedin a neat vandyked form; the ears, as also the septum narium, wereperforated, and in them were worn tortoiseshell rings; around the waistwas worn a narrow piece of native cloth (died either of a dark red oryellow colour), or a small narrow mat formed from the bark of a tree,and of fine texture; some of these had neatly-worked dark red borders,apparently done with the fibres of some dyed bark. They rub their bodieswith scented cocoa-nut oil as well as turmeric. The canoes were neatlyconstructed, had outriggers, and much resemble