world; and the news of our good
fortune brought us troops of tayos, or friends, eager to form an alliance after
the national custom, and do our slightest bidding.
    The really curious way in which all the Polynesians are in the habit of
making bosom friends at the shortest possible notice is deserving of remark.
Although, among a people like the Tahitians, vitiated as they are by
sophisticating influences, this custom has in most cases degenerated into a mere
mercenary relation, it nevertheless had its origin in a fine, and in some
instances, heroic sentiment, formerly entertained by their fathers.
    In the annals of the island are examples of extravagant friendships,
unsurpassed by the story of Damon and Pythias: in truth, much more wonderful;
for, notwithstanding the devotion - even of life in some cases - to which they
led, they were frequently entertained at first sight for some stranger from
another island.
    Filled with love and admiration for the first whites who came among them,
the Polynesians could not testify the warmth of their emotions more strongly
than by instantaneously making their abrupt proffer of friendship. Hence, in old
voyages we read of chiefs coming off from the shore in their canoes, and going
through with strange antics, expressive of this desire. In the same way, their
inferiors accosted the seamen; and thus the practice has continued in some
islands down to the present day.
    There is a small place, not many days' sail from Tahiti, and seldom visited
by shipping, where the vessel touched to which I then happened to belong.
    Of course, among the simple-hearted natives, we had a friend all round. Mine
was Poky, a handsome youth, who never could do enough for me. Every morning at
sunrise, his canoe came alongside loaded with fruits of all kinds; upon being
emptied, it was secured by a line to the bowsprit, under which it lay all day
long, ready at any time to carry its owner ashore on an errand.
    Seeing him so indefatigable, I told Poky one day, that I was a virtuoso in
shells and curiosities of all kinds. That was enough; away he paddled for the
head of the bay, and I never saw him again for twenty-four hours. The next
morning, his canoe came gliding slowly along the shore, with the full-leaved
bough of a tree for a sail. For the purpose of keeping the things dry, he had
also built a sort of platform just behind the prow, railed in with green
wicker-work; and here was a heap of yellow bananas and cowree shells;