slightly pressed, they were packed in barrels, with a thin
layer of salt between them. I brought home with me some barrels of
this pork, which was pickled at Owhyhee in January, 1779, and was
tasted by several persons in England about Christmas, 1780, and found
perfectly sound and wholesome.[6]

[Footnote 5: 14 lb.]

[Footnote 6: Since these papers were prepared for the press, I have
been informed by Mr Vancouver, who was one of my midshipmen in the
Discovery, and was afterward appointed lieutenant of the Martin sloop
of war, that he tried the method here recommended, both with English
and Spanish pork, during a cruize on the Spanish Main, in the year
1782, and succeeded to the utmost of his expectations. He also
made the experiment at Jamaica with the beef served by the
victualling-office to the ships, but not with the same success, which
he attributes to the want of the necessary precautions in killing and
handling the beasts; to their being hung up and opened before they
had sufficient time to bleed, by which means the blood-vessels were
exposed to the air, and the blood condensed before it had time to
empty itself, and to their being hard driven and bruised. He adds,
that having himself attended to the killing of an ox, which was
carefully taken on board the Martin, he salted a part of it, which, at
the end of the week, was found to have taken the salt completely,
and he has no doubt would have kept for any length of time; but the
experiment was not tried.]

I shall now return to our transactions on shore at the observatory,
where we had not been long settled before we discovered, in our
neighbourhood, the habitation of a society of priests, whose regular
attendance at the _morai_ had excited our curiosity. Their huts stood
round a pond of water, and were surrounded by a grove of cocoa-nut
trees, which separated them from the beach and the rest of the
village, and gave the place an air of religious retirement. On my
acquainting Captain Cook with these circumstances, he resolved to pay
them a visit; and, as he expected to be received in the same manner
as before, he brought Mr Webber with him to make a drawing of the
ceremony.

On his arrival at the beach, he was conducted to a sacred building
called _Harre-no-Orono_, or the house of _Orono_, and seated before
the entrance, at the foot of a wooden idol, of the same kind with
those on the _morai_. I was here again made to support one of his
arms; and, after wrap