Note 208 — CHAP. XI.

If, to the copious descriptions that occur in the preceding pages, of the particular entertainments exhibited in Hapaee and Tongataboo, we add the general view of the usual amusements of the inhabitants of these islands, contained in this paragraph, and compare it with the quotations from the Jesuit’s Letters, in a former note (p. 255.), we shall be still more forcibly struck with the reasonableness of tracing such singularly resembling customs to one common source. The argument, in confirmation of this, drawn from identity of language, has been already illustrated, by observing the remarkable coincidence of the name by which the chiefs at the Caroline Islands, and those at Hamao, one of the Friendly ones, are distinguished. But the argument does not rest on a single instance, though that happens to be a very striking one. Another of the very few specimens of the dialect of the North Pacific islanders, preserved by father Cantova, furnishes an additional proof. Immediately after the passage above referred to, he proceeds thus: “Ce divertissement s’appelle, en leur langue, tanger ifaifil; qui veut dire, la plainte des femmes.” Lettres Edifiantes et Curieuses, tom. xv. p. 315. Now, it is very remarkable, that we learn from Mr. Anderson’s collection of words, which will appear in this chapter, that la plainte des femmes, or, in English, the mournful song of the women, which the inhabitants of the Caroline Islands express in their language tanger ifaifil, would, by those of Tongataboo, be expressed tangee vefaine.

If any one should still doubt, in spite of this evidence, it may be recommended to his consideration, that long separation and other causes have introduced greater variations in the mode of pronouncing these two words, at places confessedly inhabited by the same race, than subsist in the specimen just given. It appears, from Mr. Anderson’s vocabulary, printed in Captain Cook’s second voyage, that what is pronounced tangee at the Friendly Islands, is taee at Otaheite: and the vefaine of the former, is the waheine of the latter.