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Updated: June 19, 2025
In short, the colonists had reason to be extremely satisfied, for this chest contained tools, weapons, instruments, clothes, books; and this is the exact list of them as stated in Gideon Spilett's note-book: Tools: 3 knives with several blades, 2 woodmen's axes, 2 carpenter's hatchets, 3 planes, 2 adzes, 1 twibil or mattock, 6 chisels, 2 files, 3 hammers, 3 gimlets, 2 augers, 10 bags of nails and screws, 3 saws of different sizes, 2 boxes of needles.
The stone which makes the blade of their adzes is a kind of basaltes, of a blackish or grey colour, not very hard, but of considerable toughness: They are formed of different sizes; some, that are intended for felling, weigh from six to eight pounds; others, that are used for carving, not more than so many ounces; but it is necessary to sharpen both almost every minute; for which purpose, a stone and a cocoa-nut shell full of water are always at hand.
On our holding up various articles they cautiously approached, and presented us with some curious fish-hooks, matting, adzes made from the shell of the Tridachna and ground very sharp, as also with numerous pearl shells. We came to the conclusion that they had some good reason to mistrust white men; indeed, we afterwards discovered that such was the case.
They have not the least knowledge of Iron or any other Metal that we know of; their working Tools must be made of Stone, bone, and Shells; those made of the former are very bad, if I may judge from one of their Adzes I have seen.
I haven't seen a pearl-shell fish-hook in years, but I swear that Kalakaua accumulated ten thousand of them, to say nothing of human jaw-bone fish-hooks, and feather cloaks, and capes and helmets, and stone adzes, and poi-pounders of phallic design. When he and Kapiolani made their royal progresses around the islands, their hosts had to hide away their personal relics.
Now the wheelwright was a choleric man, and one fine afternoon, returning from a short absence, found Tom occupied with one of his pet adzes, the edge of which was fast vanishing under our hero's care.
The vessels include paterae, bowls, jugs, amphorae, and cups; the implements, hatchets, adzes, knives, and sickles; the arms, spearheads, arrowheads, daggers, battle-axes, helmets, and shields; the toilet articles, mirrors, hand-bells, buckles, candlesticks, &c.; the furniture, tall candelabra, tripods, and thrones.
There was no passage through the reef, so the Bishop and Patteson took off their coats, one took two hatchets and the other two adzes, and with a good header, swam ashore.
Amongst the tools, one resembling our adze is in the most common use; and it is remarkable that the handles of these implements are often composed of human bones. In the museum of the Church Missionary Society there are adzes, the handle of one of which is formed of the bone of a human arm, and another of that of a leg.
In the same way, Destiny and the Fates are the universal shipwrights, and you are their drills and adzes; and it seems to me that instead of paying their respects and their sacrifices to you, men ought to sacrifice to Destiny, and implore her favours; though even that would not meet the case, because I take it that things are settled once and for all, and that the Fates themselves are not at liberty to chop and change.
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