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The country was very ridgy and hilly; and we found it exceedingly difficult to proceed along the river. We observed the poplar-gum again in the open forest, and a fine drooping loranthus growing on it. Pandanus was also very frequent, in clusters from three to eight trees. The clustered fig-tree gave us an ample supply of fruit, which, however, was not perfectly mellow.
This circumstance may explain the discovery, in a coffin which was eaten to pieces by worms, and quite mouldered away, of a well-preserved skeleton, or rather a mummy, for in many places there were carcasses clothed with dry fibers of muscle and skin. It lay upon a mat of pandanus, which was yet recognizable, with a cushion under the head stuffed with plants, and covered with matting of pandanus.
The language was equally well understood by Omai and the two New Zealanders. From the small island which had been seen three days before, and to which the ships now steered, all that was required was obtained, consisting of grass and leaves of young cocoanut trees and of the pandanus.
Never was there one like it ever fished up in Hikueru, nor in all the Paumotus, nor in all the world. Buy it from him. He has it now. And remember that I told you first. He is a fool and you can get it cheap. Have you any tobacco?" Straight up the beach to a shack under a pandanus tree Raoul headed.
Mounting again, we were joined by two native women, who were travelling the greater part of the way hither, and this made it more cheerful for D. The elder one had nothing on her head but her wild black hair, and she wore a black holuku, a lei of the orange seeds of the pandanus, orange trousers and big spurs strapped on her bare feet.
If you are so fortunate as to enter the bay on a fine day you will see a very tropical landscape a long, pleasant, curved sweep of beach, on which the surf is breaking, and beyond, white houses nestling among cocoa-nut groves, and bread-fruit, pandanus, and other Southern trees, many of them bearing brilliant flowers; with shops and stores along the beach.
Garlands of the fruit of the palm-nut, or pandanus, and cocoa leaves, twisted by the priests in mysterious knots, with a plant called by them Ethee no Morai, which is particularly consecrated to funeral solemnities, are deposited about the place; provision and water are also left at a little distance, of which, and of other decorations, a more particular description has been given already.
As the frigate drew near, a white sandy beach was seen, and, higher up, a belt of land of a light clay colour, on which grew a few shrubs not more than fifteen feet high, above which towered the pandanus, cocoa-nut, and palms.
We saw a low range in form of a horse-shoe, to the westward; and a higher one beyond it in the distance. We encamped at a small river, which had just ceased running, but contained in its bed two chains of small deep ponds full of perches, and shaded with Pandanus and drooping tea-trees, which grew to a large size all over the bed between the two ponds.
Large groves of pandanus and hibiscus, and a variety of other plants, were growing in great luxuriance upon the banks of the Prince Regent's River, but, unhappily, the sterile and rocky appearance of the country was some alloy to the satisfaction we felt at the first sight of the fresh water." Water had been obtained sufficient to last until October.
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