amongst the rest of the natives upon deck, the face of affairs was entirely turned, and Ootee, who would hardly speak to Omai before, now begged that they might be tayos (friends), and exchange names.  Omai accepted of the honour, and confirmed it with a present of red feathers, and Ootee, by way of return, sent ashore for a hog.  But it was evident to every one of us, that it was not the man, but his property, they were in love with.  Had he not shewn to them his treasure of red feathers, which is the commodity in greatest estimation at the island, I question much whether they would have bestowed even a cocoa-nut upon him.  Such was Omai’s first reception amongst his countrymen.  I own, I never expected it would be otherwise; but still I was in hopes that the valuable cargo of presents with which the liberality of his friends in England had loaded him, would be the means of raising him into consequence, and of making him respected, and even courted by the first persons throughout the extent of the Society Islands.  This could not but have happened, had he conducted himself with any degree of prudence; but, instead of it, I am sorry to say that he paid too little regard to the repeated advice of those who wished him well, and suffered himself to be duped by every designing knave.  From the natives who came off to us, in the course of this day, we learnt that two ships had twice been in Oheitepeha Bay, since my last visit to this island in 1774, and that they had left animals there such as we had on board.  But, on farther enquiry, we found they were only hogs, dogs, goats, one bull, and the male of some other animal, which, from the imperfect description now given us, we could not find out.  They told us that these ships had come from a place called Reema, by which we guessed that Lima, the capital of Peru, was meant, and that these late visitors were Spaniards.  We were informed that the first time they came, they built a house, and left four men behind them, viz. two priests, a boy or servant, and a fourth person called Mateema, who was much spoken of at this time, carrying away with them, when they sailed, four of the natives; that, in about ten months, the same two ships returned, bringing back two of the islanders, the other two having died at Lima, and that, after a short stay, they took away their own people; but that the house which they had built was left standing.

The important news of red feathers being on board our ships, having been conveyed on shore by Omai’s friends, day had no sooner begun to break, next morning, than we were surrounded by a multitude of canoes, crowded with people, bringing hogs and fruits to market.  At first, a quantity of feathers, not greater than what might be got from a tom-tit, would purchase a hog of forty or fifty pounds weight.  But, as almost every body in the ships was possessed of some of this precious article of trade, it fell in its value above five hundred per cent. before night.  However, even then, the balance was much in our favour, and red feathers continued to preserve their superiority over every other commodity.  Some of the natives would not part with a hog, unless they received an axe in exchange; but nails and beads, and other trinkets, which, during our former voyages, had so great a run at this island, were now so much despised, that few would deign so much as to look at them.