you; and I very well like to have some
talk with you to-day. Good friends, very bad times in Tahiti; it make
me weep. Pomaree is gone--the island no more yours, but the Wee-wees'
(French). Wicked priests here, too; and wicked idols in woman's
clothes, and brass chains.

"Good friends, no you speak, or look at them--but I know you
won't--they belong to a set of robbers--the wicked Wee-wees. Soon these
bad men be made to go very quick. Beretanee ships of thunder come and
away they go. But no more 'bout this now. I speak more by by.

"Good friends, many whale-ships here now; and many bad men come in
'em. No good sailors living--that you know very well. They come here,
'cause so bad they no keep 'em home.

"My good little girls, no run after sailors--no go where they go; they
harm you. Where they come from, no good people talk to 'em--just like
dogs. Here, they talk to Pomaree, and drink arva with great Poofai.

"Good friends, this very small island, but very wicked, and very poor;
these two go together. Why Beretanee so great? Because that island
good island, and send mickonaree to poor kannaka In Beretanee, every
man rich: plenty things to buy; and plenty things to sell. Houses
bigger than Pomaree's, and more grand. Everybody, too, ride about in
coaches, bigger than hers; and wear fine tappa every day. (Several
luxurious appliances of civilization were here enumerated, and
described.)

"Good friends, little to eat left at my house. Schooner from Sydney no
bring bag of flour: and kannaka no bring pig and fruit enough.
Mickonaree do great deal for kannaka; kannaka do little for
mickonaree. So, good friends, weave plenty of cocoa-nut baskets, fill
'em, and bring 'em to-morrow."

Such was the substance of great part of this discourse; and, whatever
may be thought of it, it was specially adapted to the minds of the
islanders: who are susceptible to no impressions, except from things
palpable, or novel and striking. To them, a dry sermon would be dry
indeed.

The Tahitians can hardly ever be said to reflect: they are all
impulse; and so, instead of expounding dogmas, the missionaries give
them the large type, pleasing cuts, and short and easy lessons of the
primer. Hence, anything like a permanent religious impression is
seldom or never produced.

In fact, there is, perhaps, no race upon earth, less disposed, by
nature, to the monitions of Christianity, than the people of the
South Seas. And this assertion is made wi