the changes of the fky; now encouraging their hope by telling them that it was clear, and now alarming their fears by an account that it was hazey. 1769. June. At day-break they got up, and had the fatisfaction to fee Saturday 36 the fun rife, without a cloud. Mr. Banks then, wishing the obfervers, Mr. Gore and Mr. Monkhoufe, fuccefs, repaired again to the island, that he might examine its produce, and get a fresh supply of provisions: he began by trading with the natives, for which purpose he took his ftation under a tree; and to keep them from preffing upon him in a crowd, he drew a circle round him, which he fuffered none of them to enter. About eight o'clock, he faw two canoes coming towards the place, and was given to understand by the people about him, that they belonged to TARRAO, the King of the island, who was coming to make him a vifit. As foon as the canoes came near the fhore, the people made a lane from the beach to the trading-place, and his Majesty landed, with his fifter, whose name was NUNA; as they advanced towards the tree where Mr. Banks stood, he went out to meet them, and, with great formality, introduced them into the circle from which the other natives had been excluded. As it is the custom of thefe people to fit during all their conferences, Mr. Banks unwrapped a kind of Turban of Indian cloth, which he wore upon his head instead of a hat, and spreading it upon the ground, they all fat down upon it together. The royal prefent was then brought, which confifted of a hog and a dog, fome bread-fruit, cocoa-nuts, and other articles of the like kind. Mr. Banks then dispatched a canoe to the observatory for his prefent, and the meffengers foon returned with an adze, a fhirt, and fome beads, which were prefented to his Majefty, and received with great fatisfaction. VOL. II. T Bv 1769. June. Saturday 3. Sunday 4. By this time, Tubourai Tamaide and Tomio joined them, from the obfervatory. Tomio faid, that she was related to Tarrao, and brought him a prefent of a long nail, at the fame time complimenting Nuna with a shirt. The first internal contact of the planet with the fun being over, Mr. Banks returned to the observatory, taking Tarrao, Nuna, and fome of their principal attendants, among whom were three very handsome young women, with him: he showed them the planet upon the fun, and endeavoured to make them understand that he and his companions had come from their own country on purpose to see it. Soon after, Mr. Banks returned with them to the island, where he spent the rest of the day in examining its produce, which he found to be much the fame with that of Otaheite. The people whom he saw there also exactly refembled the inhabitants of that island, and many of them were perfons whom he had seen upon it; fo that all thofe whom he had dealt with, knew of what his trading articles confifted, and the value they bore. The next morning, having ftruck the tents, they fet out on their return, and arrived at the fort before night. The obfervation was made with equal fuccefs by the perfons whom I had fent to the eastward, and at the fort, there not being a cloud in the sky from the rifing to the setting of the fun, the whole paffage of the planet Venus over the fun's disk was observed with great advantage by Mr. Green, Dr. Solander, and myfelf: Mr. Green's telescope and mine were of the fame magnifying power, but that of Dr. Solander was greater. We all faw an atmosphere or dusky cloud round the body of the planet, which very much disturbed the times of contact, especially of the internal ones; and we differed from each other in our accounts of the times of the contacts contacts much more than might have been expected. According to Mr. Green, The latitude of the obfervatory was found to be 17° 29′ 15′′; and the longitude 149° 32′ 30′′ W. of Greenwich. A more particular account will appear by the tables, for which the reader is referred to the Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. Ixi. part 2. page 397 & feq. where they are illustrated by a cut. But if we had reafon to congratulate ourselves upon the fuccefs of our obfervation, we had scarce lefs caufe to regret the diligence with which that time had been improved by fome of our people to another purpose. While the attention of the officers was engroffed by the Tranfit of Venus, some of the ship's company broke into one of the ftore-rooms, and stole a quantity of spike nails, amounting to no less than one hundred weight: this was a matter of public and serious concern; for these nails, if circulated by the people among the Indians, would do us irreparable injury, by reducing the value of iron, our ftaple commodity. One of the thieves was detected, but only seven nails were found in his cuftody. He was punished with two dozen lashes, but would impeach none of his accomplices. 1769. June. 1769. June. Monday 5. CHA P. XIV. The Ceremonies of an Indian Funeral particularly defcribed: General Obfervations on the Subject: A Character found among the Indians to which the Ancients paid great Veneration: A Robbery at the Fort, and its Confequences; with a Specimen of Indian Cookery, and various Incidents. Ο N the 5th, we kept his Majesty's birth-day; for though it is the 4th, we were unwilling to celebrate it during the absence of the two parties who had been fent out to obferve the Tranfit. We had feveral of the Indian Chiefs at our entertainment, who drank his Majefty's health by the name of Kihiargo, which was the nearest imitation they could produce of King George. About this time died an old woman of fome rank, who was related to Tomio, which gave us an opportunity to fee how they disposed of the body, and confirmed us in our opinion that these people, contrary to the present custom of all other nations now known, never bury their dead. In the middle of a small square, neatly railed in with bamboo, the awning of a canoe was raised upon two pofts, and under this the body was depofited upon fuch a frame as has before been described: it was covered with fine cloth, and near it was placed bread- fruit, fish, and other provifions: we fuppofed that the food was placed there for the spirit of the deceased, and confequently, that these Indians had fome confused notion of a feparate ftate; but upon our applying for further further information to Tubourai Tamaide, he told us, that the food was placed there as an offering to their gods. They do not, however, fuppofe, that the gods eat, any more than the Jews fuppofed that Jehovah could dwell in a house the offering is made here upon the fame principle as the Temple was built at Jerufalem, as an expreffion of reverence and gratitude, and a folicitation of the more immediate prefence of the Deity. In the front of the area was a kind of ftile, where the relations of the deceased stood to pay the tribute of their forrow; and under the awning were innumerable fmall pieces of cloth, on which the tears and blood of the mourners had been fhed; for in their paroxyfms of grief it is a univerfal cuftom to wound themselves with the fhark's tooth. Within a few yards two occafional houses were fet up, in one of which fome relations of the deceased constantly refided, and in the other the chief mourner, who is always a man, and who keeps there a very fingular dress in which a ceremony is performed that will be defcribed in its turn. Near the place where the dead are thus fet up to rot, the bones are afterwards buried. What can have introduced among these people the custom of expofing their dead above ground, till the flesh is confumed by putrefaction, and then burying the bones, it is perhaps impoffible to guefs; but it is remarkable, that Elian and Apollonius Rhodius impute a fimilar practice to the ancient inhabitants of Colchis, a country near Pontus in Afia, now called Mingrelia; except that among them this manner of difpofing of the dead did not extend to both fexes: the women they buried; but the men they wrapped in a hide, and hung up in the air by a chain. This practice among the Colchians is referred to a religious caufe. The principal objects of their worship were the Earth and the Air; and it is fuppofed that, in confequence of fame fuperftitious notion, they |