Fanning, a Yankee mariner of some reputation, likewise records his lively impressions of the physical appearance of these people; and Commodore David Porter of the U.S.
frigate Essex, is said to have been vastly smitten by the beauty of the ladies.

Their great superiority over all other Polynesians cannot fail to attract the notice of those who visit the principal groups in the Pacific.

The voluptuous Tahitians are the only people who at all deserve to be compared with them; while the dark-haired Hawaiians and the woolly-headed Feejees are immeasurably inferior to them.

The distinguishing characteristic of the Marquesan islanders, and that which at once strikes you, is the European cast of their features--a peculiarity seldom observable among other uncivilized people.

Many of their faces present profiles classically beautiful, and in the valley of Typee I saw several who, like the stranger Marnoo, were in every respect models of beauty.
* This passage, which is cited as an almost literal translation from the original, I found in a small volume entitled 'Circumnavigation of the Globe, in which volume are several extracts from 'Dalrymple's Historical Collections'.