Chapter Eleven - Page 2

the same time wonderfully
polite and humane; fanning aside the insects that occasionally
lighted on our brows; presenting us with food; and
compassionately regarding me in the midst of my afflictions. But
in spite of all their blandishments, my feelings of propriety
were exceedingly shocked, for I could but consider them as having
overstepped the due limits of female decorum.

Having diverted themselves to their hearts' content, our young
visitants now withdrew, and gave place to successive troops of
the other sex, who continued flocking towards the house until
near noon; by which time I have no doubt that the greater part of
the inhabitants of the valley had bathed themselves in the light
of our benignant countenances.

At last, when their numbers began to diminish, a superb-looking
warrior stooped the towering plumes of his head-dress beneath
the low portal, and entered the house. I saw at once that he was
some distinguished personage, the natives regarding him with the
utmost deference, and making room for him as he approached. His
aspect was imposing. The splendid long drooping tail-feathers of
the tropical bird, thickly interspersed with the gaudy plumage of
the cock, were disposed in an immense upright semicircle upon his
head, their lower extremities being fixed in a crescent of
guinea-heads which spanned the forehead. Around his neck were
several enormous necklaces of boar's tusks, polished like ivory,
and disposed in such a manner as that the longest and largest
were upon his capacious chest. Thrust forward through the large
apertures in his ears were two small and finely-shaped sperm
whale teeth, presenting their cavities in front, stuffed with
freshly-plucked leaves, and curiously wrought at the other end
into strange little images and devices. These barbaric trinkets,
garnished in this manner at their open extremities, and tapering
and curving round to a point behind the ear, resembled not a
little a pair of cornucopias.

The loins of the warrior were girt about with heavy folds of a
dark-coloured tappa, hanging before and behind in clusters of
braided tassels, while anklets and bracelets of curling human
hair completed his unique costume. In his right hand he grasped
a beautifully carved paddle-spear, nearly fifteen feet in length,
made of the bright koar-wood, one end sharply pointed, and the
other flattened like an oar-blade. Hanging obliquely from his
girdle by a loop of sinnate was a richly decorated pipe; the
slender reed forming its stem was coloured with a red pigment,
and round it, as well as the idol-bowl, fluttered little
streamers of the thinnest tappa.

But that which was most remarkable in the appearance of this
splendid islander was the