"It was common," they say, "to see three or four old men in
a house, whereas you rarely see more than one now." Among a people
destitute of statistics or records of any kind, it is difficult to
speak correctly of an earlier date than 1830. Since that time,
however, the population has been remarkably stationary. We have not
observed any marked disproportion in the deaths of adults of any
particular age compared with other parts of the world. A person died
in 1847 who was present at the massacre of M. de Langle and others
connected with the exploring expedition of La Perouse in 1787, and who
was then a youth of about fourteen years of age. Judging from his
appearance, we may suppose that there are some in every village who
must be sixty, seventy, and even eighty years of age.

They have stories of a _giant race_, and tell particularly of one
called _Tafai_. He was very tall and strong, but not cruel to any one.
He could throw a long cocoa-nut tree at the rocks as if he were but
hurling a thin spear. He plucked up by the roots a great Malili tree,
eighty feet high, carried it off on his shoulder, branches and all,
and could throw it up and catch it again as if he were playing with a
small crab. It is said, too, that so great was his weight, if he put
his foot on a rock it left a footprint as if the rock had been soft
sand.

_Diseases._--Pulmonary affections, paralysis, diseases of the spine
producing humpback, ophthalmia, skin diseases, scrofulous, and other
ulcers, elephantiasis, and a species of leprosy, are among the
principal diseases with which they were afflicted. Ophthalmia and
various diseases of the eye were very prevalent. There were few cases
of total blindness; but many had one of the organs of vision
destroyed. Connected with diseases of the eye, pterygium is common;
not only single, but double, triple, and even quadruple are
occasionally met with. The leprosy of which we speak has greatly
abated. The natives say that formerly many had it, and suffered from
its ulcerous sores until all the fingers of a hand or the toes of a
foot had fallen off. Elephantiasis, producing great enlargement of the
legs and arms, has, they think, somewhat abated too; only, they say,
it prevails among the _young_ men more now than it did formerly.
Insanity is occasionally met with. It was invariably traced in former
times to the immediate presence of an evil spirit. If furious, the
party was tied hand to hand and foot to foot unt