[7] We have elsewhere had occasion to take notice of the fact of human
    sacrifices and cannibalism, forming an essential particular in the
    history of all the South Sea islanders.  It is unnecessary to occupy a
    moment’s attention in farther enquiry respecting it, as perhaps no
    question, in the circle of philosophical research, has received more
    complete solution by the testimony of credible witnesses.  He that
    shall attempt to controvert their evidence, will have need of all the
    effrontery and invincibility to truth that ever stamped the forehead
    or hardened the heart of a polemist.—­E.

[8] Here, then, we have two reasons for the practice of tattowing, in
    addition to those which we enumerated in the account of Cook’s first
    voyage, provided only that Captain King’s information can he relied
    on.  The first of these, it may be remarked, is so extremely similar to
    the practice of wounding or cutting the body for the dead, which has
    prevailed so extensively, that we can have no difficulty in allowing
    the full force of the observation.  But, with respect to the second,
    one may incline to demur, on the ground of the improbability that such
    a state of servitude as it implies, could exist in so apparently
    primitive a condition of society.  This, however, is not difficult of
    explanation, as the reader will find in the following section, from
    which one may safely infer, that the government of the Sandwich
    islands is by no means one which requires for its exhibition, the
    innocence, the liberty, and equality of the golden age.  Some
    conclusion may hence be drawn as to the probable origin and antiquity
    of these islanders.  But it is obvious that we are far from possessing
    sufficient data to enable us to enter satisfactorily on the discussion
    of the topic.—­E.

[9] Mr Playfair in his Geography, vol. vi. p. 839, asserts, that the
    Sandwich islands were first discovered by Gaetano, a Spanish
    navigator, in 1542; but he does not assign his authority, or give any
    clue for which the position may be verified.  The fact is certainly
    probable, as Captain King seems to admit; and supposing it so, we can
    easily conceive that the distance of time from the period of the
    discovery above stated, would be quite sufficient to account for the
    natives having no tradition of such a visit.  Even a much shorter
    period would be adequate for the total loss of almost any event in the
    current history of a people, who had no other method of preserving it
    than the impression it made on the senses, and to whom there was no
    excitement to impress it on the memories of succeeding generations,
    arising from the importance of the circumstances connected with it. 
    The possession of iron, indeed,