Note (return) — Chapter III · TRANSACTIONS AT OTAHEITE, AND THE SOCIETY ISLANDS; AND PROSECUTION OF THE VOYAGE TO THE COAST OF NORTH AMERICA.

Hitherto, the attention of Otoo and his people had been confined to us; but, next morning, a new scene of business opened, by the arrival of some messengers from Eimeo, or (as it is much oftener called by the natives) Morea,2 with intelligence, that the people in that island were in arms; and that Otoo's partizans there had been worsted, and obliged to retreat to the mountains. The quarrel between the two islands, which commenced in 1774, as mentioned in the account of my last voyage, had, it seems, partly subsisted ever since. The formidable armament which I saw at that time, and described, had sailed soon after I then left Otaheite; but the malcontents of Eimeo had made so stout a resistance, that the fleet had returned without effecting much; and now another expedition was necessary.