Nowhere are the ladies more assiduously courted; nowhere are they better appreciated as the contributors to our highest enjoyments; and nowhere are they more sensible of their power.

Far different from their condition among many rude nations, where the women are made to perform all the work while their ungallant lords and masters lie buried in sloth, the gentle sex in the valley of Typee were exempt from toil, if toil it might be called that, even in the tropical climate, never distilled one drop of perspiration.

Their light household occupations, together with the manufacture of tappa, the platting of mats, and the polishing of drinking-vessels, were the only employments pertaining to the women.

And even these resembled those pleasant avocations which fill up the elegant morning leisure of our fashionable ladies at home.

But in these occupations, slight and agreeable though they were, the giddy young girls very seldom engaged.