r in our
own land could not have played together for the space of an hour without
biting or scratching one another. There you might have seen a throng of
young females, not filled with envyings of each other's charms, nor
displaying the ridiculous affectations of gentility, nor yet moving in
whalebone corsets, like so many automatons, but free, inartificially happy
and unconstrained.

There were some spots in that sunny vale where they would frequently
resort to decorate themselves with garlands of flowers. To have seen them
reclining beneath the shadows of one of the beautiful groves, the ground
about them strewn with freshly gathered buds and blossoms, employed in
weaving chaplets and necklaces, one would have thought that all the train
of Flora had gathered together to keep a festival in honour of their
mistress.

With the young men there seemed almost always some matter of diversion or
business on hand, that afforded a constant variety of enjoyment. But
whether fishing, or carving canoes, or polishing their ornaments, never
was there exhibited the least sign of strife or contention among them.

As for the warriors, they maintained a tranquil dignity of demeanour,
journeying occasionally from house to house, where they were always sure
to be received with the attention bestowed upon distinguished guests. The
old men, of whom there were many in the vale, seldom stirred from their
mats, where they would recline for hours and hours, smoking and talking to
one another with all the garrulity of age.

But the continual happiness which, so far as I was able to judge, appeared
to prevail in the valley, sprung principally from that all-pervading
sensation which Rousseau has told us he at one time experienced, the mere
buoyant sense of a healthful physical existence. And, indeed, in this
particular the Typees had ample reason to felicitate themselves, for
sickness was almost unknown. During the whole period of my stay, I saw but
one invalid among them; and on their smooth clear skins you observed no
blemish or mark of disease.

The general repose, however, upon which I have just been descanting, was
broken in upon about this time by an event, which proved that the
islanders were not entirely exempt from those occurrences which disturb
the quiet of more civilized communities.

Having now been a considerable time in the valley, I began to feel
surprised that the violent hostility subsisting between its inhabitants
and tho