communication with foreigners, are in every respect unchanged
from their earliest known condition.

In the bay of Nukuheva was the anchorage we desired to reach. We
had perceived the loom of the mountains about sunset; so that
after running all night with a very light breeze, we found
ourselves close in with the island the next morning, but as the
bay we sought lay on its farther side, we were obliged to sail
some distance along the shore, catching, as we proceeded, short
glimpses of blooming valleys, deep glens, waterfalls, and waving
groves hidden here and there by projecting and rocky headlands,
every moment opening to the view some new and startling scene of
beauty.

Those who for the first time visit the South Sea, generally are
surprised at the appearance of the islands when beheld from the
sea. From the vague accounts we sometimes have of their beauty,
many people are apt to picture to themselves enamelled and softly
swelling plains, shaded over with delicious groves, and watered
by purling brooks, and the entire country but little elevated
above the surrounding ocean. The reality is very different; bold
rock-bound coasts, with the surf beating high against the lofty
cliffs, and broken here and there into deep inlets, which open to
the view thickly-wooded valleys, separated by the spurs of
mountains clothed with tufted grass, and sweeping down towards
the sea from an elevated and furrowed interior, form the
principal features of these islands.

Towards noon we drew abreast the entrance go the harbour, and at
last we slowly swept by the intervening promontory, and entered