CHAPTER V.
OF THE POLYNESIAN NATIONS PROPERLY SO TERMED,
OR THE ISLANDERS OF EASTERN OCEAN ICA.
S e c t io n I.— General Remarks.
The Polynesian nations properly so termed are those tribes
of the great Malayo-Polynesian family who inhabit the different
groupes of islands spread through the Pacifier Ocean.
These nations, though differing considerably from each other
in dialect, especially in distant islands where the several tribes
of people appear to have been long separated, may be ,sgid;for
the most part to speak one language, since with few 'exceptions
they mutually understand each other with little difficulty.
The extent of the region belonging to the proper Polynesian
tribes, and designated by late writers as Eastern pr. Opeanip
Polynesia, may be thus defined. The Tongan.and the Fijian
or Vitian Archipelago are its western departments in the Great
Ocean: thence it reaches eastward across the whole breadth
of the Pacific, wherever islands exist inhabited by tribes of
the same race. To the northward of the Vitian and $he
Tongan groupes are the different clusters of islands inhabited
by tribes of a kindred race, who will be described under the
name of the Mlcronesian Islanders. To the westward of the
Vitian groupe a vast amphitheatre of islands reaching southward
from the eastern extremity of New Britain, a part of
Papua-land, and facing the wide spaces of the Eastern
Pacific, under the names of Solomon’s Archipelago and the
New Hebrides, forms the great boundary between Eastern
Polynesia and the. less explored region, which will be hereafter
described, of Oceanic Negroland. The inhabitants of
the islands and continents comprehended under this last name
are for the most part black or nearly black, more barbarous
in their manners, and differing in language from the
Polynesians.
I now proceed to the different branches o f the Polynesian
race.
S ection II .-^The Tongan Islanders.
The groupe or archipelago of theTongan Isles, so termed by
modern navigators, comprises, according to the most accurate
accounts, six islands, of which the population is as
follows-:-—*
Eooa ......................... . . . . . . . . . . . 20Q
Hapai . . . . . . . . . ____ . _ . . . . . . . . . . 4000
Vavao . . . . . . . . . . ___. . . . . . . . . . . . . 4000
Keppel’s Island.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1000
Boscawen’s Island . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1300
Tonga or Tonga-tabfi . . . . . . . . -a.. . i #000
Total.. .. ,18,500
The present mimber iri Toriga is said tó b ff eftereased by
1000.'' About 45ÜÖ of the nattVeS are Christians.
Thësè 'islands arè tefrffed sometimes the Hapai Islands
froin öne 'meiïibër of the gtoup’e .- Captain Cook called
them Pridffdfy Islands. The prevailing name is that of thé
principal island, Toffgff-thbii oi thé Sacrèd 'Tóhgk,! which
is held in a Sort of veneration by the Tofigan fkceas' containing
thé' sèpulehres o f3 their forefathers, and as the residence of
théir chieftains or princbs.'
The laiigii&ge ‘óf the Tonga islanders ‘makes,—we have
repeated the Observation of Humboldt,—a certain approach
towards the character of the western idioms b f this stock. It
recedes from the forms Of the three other principal dialects, and
has Some characteristics in ffOmmon with* the Malayan which
are hot found iff the Miorfis of Ifew Zealand dr iff the Tahitian
or Hawaiian. These differences consist chiefly iff the preference
of certain consonants. The Tongan, however, agrees with the