Accordingly I questioned him concerning the disappearance of my companion, but he denied all knowledge of the matter.

I then inquired from whence he had come?
He replied, from Nukuheva.

When I expressed my surprise, he looked at me for a moment, as if enjoying my perplexity, and then with his strange vivacity, exclaimed,--'Ah! Me taboo,--me go Nukuheva,--me go Tior,--me go Typee,--me go everywhere,--nobody harm me,--me taboo.' This explanation would have been altogether unintelligible to me, had it not recalled to my mind something I had previously heard concerning a singular custom among these islanders.

Though the country is possessed by various tribes, whose mutual hostilities almost wholly prelude any intercourse between them; yet there are instances where a person having ratified friendly relations with some individual belonging longing to the valley, whose inmates are at war with his own, may, under particular restrictions, venture with impunity into the country of his friend, where, under other circumstances, he would have been treated as an enemy.

In this light are personal friendships regarded among them, and the individual so protected is said to be 'taboo', and his person, to a certain extent, is held as sacred.