Iron here, more precious than gold, bears down every barrier of restraint; honesty and modesty yield to the force of temptation.'[2] Such are the females and the mothers here described, whose interesting offspring are now peopling Pitcairn's Island, and who, while they inherit their mothers' virtues, have hitherto kept themselves free from their vices.
The greater part of the food of Otaheitans is vegetable.

Hogs, dogs, and poultry are their only animals, and all of them serve for food.

'We all agreed,' says Cook, 'that a South-Sea dog was little inferior to an English lamb,' which he ascribes to its being kept up and fed wholly on vegetables.

Broiling and baking are the only two modes of applying fire to their cookery.

Captain Wallis observes, that having no vessel in which water could be subjected to the action of fire, they had no more idea that it could be made _hot_, than that it could be made _solid_; and he mentions that one of the attendants of the supposed queen, having observed the surgeon fill the tea-pot from an urn, turned the cock himself, and received the water in his hand; and that as soon as he felt himself scalded, he roared out and began to dance about the cabin with the most extravagant and ridiculous expressions of pain and astonishment; his companions, unable to conceive what was the matter, staring at him in amaze, and not without some mixture of terror.
One of Oberea's peace-offerings to Mr.Banks, for the robbery of his clothes committed in her boat, was a fine fat dog, and the way in which it was prepared and baked was as follows.