of Feejee; and that they who are once transported thither, live for ever; or, to use their own expression, are not subject to death again, but feast upon all the favourite products of their own country, with which this everlasting abode is supposed to abound.  As to the souls of the lower sort of people, they undergo a sort of transmigration; or, as they say, are eat by a bird called loata, which walks upon their graves for that purpose.

I think I may venture to assert, that they do not worship any thing that is the work of their own hands or any visible part of the creation.  They do not make offerings of hogs, dogs, and fruit, as at Otaheite, unless it be emblematically; for their morais were perfectly free from every thing of the kind.  But that they offer real human sacrifices, is, with me, beyond a doubt.  Their morais or fiatookas, (for they are called by both names, but mostly by the latter), are, as at Otaheite, and many other parts of the world, burying-grounds, and places of worship; though some of them seemed to be only appropriated to the first purpose; but these were small, and, in every other respect, inferior to the others.

Of the nature of their government, we know no more than the general outline.  A subordination is established among them, that resembles the feudal system of our progenitors in Europe.  But of its subdivisions, of the constituent parts, and in what manner they are connected, so as to form a body politic, I confess myself totally ignorant.  Some of them told us, that the power of the king is unlimited, and that the life and property of the subject is at his disposal.  But the few circumstances that fell under our observation, rather contradicted than confirmed the idea of a despotic government.  Mareewagee, old Toobou, and Feenou, acted each like petty sovereigns, and frequently thwarted the measures of the king, of which he often complained.  Neither was his court more splendid than those of the two first, who are the most powerful chiefs in the islands; and, next to them, Feenou, Mareewagee’s son, seemed to stand highest in authority.  But, however independent on the despotic power of the king the great men may be, we saw instances enough to prove, that the lower order of people have no property, nor safety for their persons, but at the will of the chiefs to whom they respectively belong.

Tongataboo is divided into many districts; of above thirty of which we learned the names.  Each of these has its particular chief, who decides differences, and distributes justice within his own district.  But we could not form any satisfactory judgment about the extent of their power in general, or their mode of proportioning punishments to crimes.  Most of these chiefs have possessions in other islands from whence they draw supplies.  At least, we know this is so with respect to the king, who, at certain established times, receives the product of his distant domains at Tongataboo, which is not only the principal place of his residence, but seemingly of all the people of consequence amongst these isles.  Its inhabitants, in common conversation, call it the Land of Chiefs, while the subordinate isles are distinguished by the appellation of Lands of Servants.