in a flannel jacket, smoking
pipes, and reading, for the hundredth time, old Revues des deux Mondes!
perpetually sighing for those ravishing scenes we passed together--those
dinners in the Bois de Bologne--the races in the alleys by
moonlight--evenings at Ranelagh, when I used to dance the _cancan_ with
poor _Reine Pomaree_, and, behold, I've a lock of her hair," running to
an escrutoire; "and is it not droll we should meet again five thousand
leagues away, and so near the veritable dominions of the great Pomaree
herself!" My young friend had cause truly to be disgusted.

We took a long stroll around the beaches and valleys at the head of the
harbor, made a number of visits, then bathed in a shallow, discolored
stream of mineral water. The district is not populous, and, during our
sojourn, the king and many of the natives had gone to a high heathenish
festival in an adjacent valley, on the opposite side of the island.
Since the occupation by the French, perfect amity had existed between
the different clans of Nukeheva, where each petty chief and people are
independent sovereigns in their romantic and secluded valleys: not so
much for mutual friendship existing between them, as in hatred to their
white visitors. The French seldom wandered to any great distance from
their quarters, fearing, possibly, the "anthropopagian tastes of their
cannibalistic brethren."

The women were tall and well shaped, with very much brighter complexions
than the Hawaiians, and, with exceptions of young girls, were all more
or less disfigured by the indigo hues of tatoo; the faces escaping with
a few delicate blue lines, or dots, on lips or cheeks. They all seemed
complimented, and gave us every assistance in deciphering different
designs engraved upon their persons, and one buxom dame, who had a large
painting similar to the tail of a peacock spread upon her shoulders,
insisted upon doffing her drapery and preceding us, that we might study
its beauties with every facility possible!

Many were decorated with bracelets and necklaces of leaves or flowers,
and some with anklets of human hair, toe nails, and other valuable
relics. All were perfumed with cocoanut oil, and smeared with another
equally odoriferous ointment, which dyed arms and faces a deep
saffron--neither cosmetic was I able to acquire a taste for, after
repeated trials; and, indeed, I may admit, that I have never conquered a
disgust, perhaps engendered by too nice a sense of perf