of sailors and marines from the frigate Essex, accompanied by at
least two thousand warriors of Happar and Nukuheva, landed in
boats and canoes at the head of the bay, and after penetrating a
little distance into the valley, met with the stoutest resistance
from its inmates. Valiantly, although with much loss, the Typees
disputed every inch of ground, and after some hard fighting
obliged their assailants to retreat and abandon their design of
conquest.

The invaders, on their march back to the sea, consoled themselves
for their repulse by setting fire to every house and temple in
their route; and a long line of smoking ruins defaced the
once-smiling bosom of the valley, and proclaimed to its pagan
inhabitants the spirit that reigned in the breasts of Christian
soldiers. Who can wonder at the deadly hatred of the Typees to
all foreigners after such unprovoked atrocities?

Thus it is that they whom we denominate 'savages' are made to
deserve the title. When the inhabitants of some sequestered
island first descry the 'big canoe' of the European rolling
through the blue waters towards their shores, they rush down to
the beach in crowds, and with open arms stand ready to embrace
the strangers. Fatal embrace! They fold to their bosom the
vipers whose sting is destined to poison all their joys; and the
instinctive feeling of love within their breast is soon converted
into the bitterest hate.

The enormities perpetrated in the South Seas upon some of the
inoffensive islanders will nigh pass belief. These things are
seldom proclaimed at home; they happen at the very ends of the