Were it not for this assertion of the natives, and none of Captain Wallis’s people being affected with the venereal disease, either while they were at Otaheite, or after they left it, I should have concluded that long before these islanders were visited by Europeans, this or some disease which is near akin to it, had existed amongst them.  For I have heard them speak of people dying of a disorder which we interpreted to be the pox before that period.  But, be this as it will, it is now far less common amongst them, than it was in the year 1769, when I first visited these isles.  They say they can cure it, and so it fully appears, for, notwithstanding most of my people had made pretty free with the women, very few of them were afterwards affected with the disorder; and those who were, had it in so slight a manner, that it is easily removed.  But among the natives, whenever it turns to a pox, they tell us it is incurable.  Some of our people pretend to have seen some of them who had this last disorder in a high degree, but the surgeon, who made it his business to enquire, could never satisfy himself in this point.  These people are, and were, before Europeans visited them, very subject to scrophulous diseases, so that a seaman might easily mistake one disorder for another.

The island of Otaheite, which, in the years 1767 and 1768, as it were, swarmed with hogs and fowls, was now so ill supplied with these animals, that hardly any thing could induce the owners to part with them.  The few they had at this time, among them, seemed to be at the disposal of the kings.  For while we lay at Oaitipiha Bay, in the kingdom of Tiarrabou, or lesser peninsula, every hog or fowl we saw we were told belonged to Waheatoua; and all we saw in the kingdom of Opoureonu, or the greater peninsula, belonged to Otoo.  During the seventeen days we were at this island, we got but twenty-four hogs, the half of which came from the two kings themselves; and, I believe, the other half were sold us by their permission or order.  We were, however, abundantly supplied with all the fruits the island produces, except bread-fruit, which was not in season either at this or the other isles.  Cocoa-nuts and plantains were what we got the most of; the latter, together with a few yams and other roots, were to us a succedaneum for bread.  At Otaheite we got great plenty of apples, and a fruit like a nectarine, called by them Aheeva.  This fruit was common to all the isles; but apples we got only at Otaheite, and found them of infinite use to the scorbutic people.  Of all the seeds that have been brought to those islands by Europeans, none have succeeded but pumpkins; and these they do not like, which is not to be wondered at.