freedom from all restraint, and, to certain degree, the equality
of condition manifested by the natives in general. No one appeared to
assume any arrogant pretensions. There was little more than a slight
difference in costume to distinguish the chiefs from the other natives.
All appeared to mix together freely, and without any reserve; although
I noticed that the wishes of a chief, even when delivered in the mildest
tone, received the same immediate obedience which elsewhere would have
been only accorded to a peremptory command. What may be the extent
of the authority of the chiefs over the rest of the tribe, I will not
venture to assert; but from all I saw during my stay in the valley, I
was induced to believe that in matters concerning the general welfare
it was very limited. The required degree of deference towards them,
however, was willingly and cheerfully yielded; and as all authority is
transmitted from father to son, I have no doubt that one of the effects
here, as elsewhere, of high birth, is to induce respect and obedience.

The civil institutions of the Marquesas Islands appear to be in this,
as in other respects, directly the reverse of those of the Tahitian and
Hawaiian groups, where the original power of the king and chiefs was far
more despotic than that of any tyrant in civilized countries. At Tahiti
it used to be death for one of the inferior orders to approach, without
permission, under the shadow, of the king's house; or to fail in paying
the customary reverence when food destined for the king was borne past
them by his messengers. At the Sandwich Islands, Kaahumanu, the gigantic
old dowager queen--a woman of nearly four hundred pounds weight, and
who is said to be still living at Mowee--was accustomed, in some of her
terrific gusts of temper, to snatch up an ordinary sized man who had
offended her, and snap his spine across her knee. Incredible as this
may seem, it is a fact. While at Lahainaluna--the residence of this
monstrous Jezebel--a humpbacked wretch was pointed out to me, who, some
twenty-five years previously, had had the vertebrae of his backbone very
seriously discomposed by his gentle mistress.

The particular grades of rank existing among the chiefs of Typee, I
could not in all cases determine. Previous to the Feast of Calabashes
I had been puzzled what particular station to assign to Mehevi. But the
important part he took upon that occasion convinced me that he had no
superior among the