the north-west the islands of Japan; due west the Marian islands, Manilla in the Philippines, and Canton in China; and on the east the coasts of California and Mexico. Hence they are so frequently resorted to by vessels navigating the northern Pacific. The establishment of the independent states of South America has greatly increased their importance, as they lie in the track of vessels passing from thence to China, or Calcutta and other parts of India, and are not only visited by these, but by those who trade for peltry, &c. with the natives of the north-west coast of America.

From the time of their discovery, the Sandwich Islands were unvisited until 1786, when Captains Dixon and Portlock, in a trading voyage to the north-west coast for furs and sea-otter skins, anchored, and procured refreshments in the island of Oahu. The island of Maui was visited about the same time by the unfortunate La Perouse. After this period the islands were frequently visited by vessels engaged in the fur trade. Captain Douglas, of the Iphigenia, and Captain Metcalf, of the Eleanor, an American snow, were nearly cut off by the turbulent chiefs, who were desirous to procure their guns and ammunition, for the purpose of carrying their purposes of conquest into effect. The son of the latter, a youth of sixteen, who commanded a schooner, called the Fair American, which accompanied the Eleanor from Canton, when close in with the land off Mouna Huararai, was becalmed; the natives thronged on board, threw young Metcalf overboard, seized and plundered the vessel, and murdered all the crew, excepting the mate, whose name was Isaac Davis. He resided many years with Tamehameha, who very

severely censured the chief under whose direction this outrage had been committed. A seaman, whose name is Young, belonging to the Eleanor, who was on shore at the time, was prevented from gaining his vessel, but was kindly treated by the king, and is still living at Towaihae.

In the years 1792 and 1793, Captain Vancouver, while engaged in a voyage of discovery in the North Pacific, spent several months at the Sandwich Islands; and notwithstanding the melancholy catastrophe which had terminated the life of Captain Cook, whom he had accompanied, and the treacherous designs of the warlike and ambitious chiefs towards several of his predecessors, he met with the most friendly treatment from all parties, and received the strongest expressions of confidence from Tamehameha, sovereign of the whole groupe, who had been wounded in the skirmish that followed the death of their discoverer, but who had ever lamented with deepest regret that melancholy event. He alone had prevented the murderous intentions of his chieftains towards former vessels from being carried into effect; and it was his uniform endeavour to shew every mark of friendship to those who visited his dominions. His attachment to the English induced him, during the stay of Captain Vancouver, to cede the island of Hawaii to the British crown, and to place himself and his dominions under British protection; an act which was repeated by his son, the late king, on his accession to the sovereignty of all the islands.

The natives received many advantages from the visit of Captain Vancouver; a breed of cattle, and a variety of useful seeds, had been given. Generous and disinterested in his whole behaviour, he secured their

friendship and attachment, and many still retain grateful recollections of his visit.

After his departure, the islands were seldom resorted to, except by traders from the United States of America, who, having discovered among them the sandal-wood, conveyed large quantities of it to Canton, where it is readily purchased by the Chinese, manufactured into incense, and burnt in their idol temples. Subsequently, the South Sea whalers began to fish in the North Pacific, when the Sandwich Islands afforded a convenient ren- . dezvous for refitting and procuring refreshments during their protracted voyages, particularly since they have found the sperm whale on the coast of Japan, where of late years the greater part of their cargoes have been procured.

As early as the year 1796, the LONDON MISSIONARY SOCIETY despatched the ship Duff to the South Sea islands; and early in 1797, missionary settlements were established in the Marquesan, Friendly, and Society islands. The missionary left at the Marquesas, after spending about a year among the people, returned. The establishment in the Friendly Islands was relinquished, though not till some of the individuals of which it was composed had fallen a sacrifice to the fury of the islanders in their cruel civil wars. The missionaries in the Society Islands have been enabled to maintain their ground, though exposed to many privations, and some ill usage; the greater part of them was at one time obliged to leave the islands, in consequence of violent assault, and the civil wars among the natives. Several of those who left, returned after a very short absence, and rejoined their companions who had remained, and the labours of the missionaries were

continued with patience and industry for fifteen years, from the time of their first establishment, without any apparent effect. After this protracted period of discouragement, God has granted them the most astonishing success; and the happy change in the outward circumstances of the people, and the great moral renovation which the reception of the gospel has effected, have more than realized the ardent desires of the missionaries themselves, and the most sanguine anticipation of the friends of the mission.

But though the efforts of the London Missionary Society were continued under appearances so inauspicious, with a degree of perseverance which has since been most amply compensated, various causes prevented their making any efforts towards communicating the knowledge of Christ to the Sandwich islanders. While their southern neighbours were enjoying all the advantages of Christianity, they remained under the thick darkness, and moral wretchedness, of one of the most cruel systems of idolatry that ever enslaved any portion of the human species.

The attention of the American churches was at length directed to the Sandwich Islands. Their sympathies were awakened, and resulted in a generous effort to meliorate the wretchedness of their inhabitants. A society already existed, under the name of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, the chief seat of whose operations was in the city of Boston, Massachusetts, though including among its members many distinguished individuals in different states of the Union.

In the autumn of 1819, a select and efficient band of missionaries was appointed by this society to establish

a mission in the Sandwich Islands. They landed at Kairua, in Hawaii, on the 4th of February, 1820, and had the satisfaction to find the way in a measure prepared for them, by one of those remarkable events which distinguish the eras in the history of nations, whether barbarous or civilized. This was no other than the abolition of the national idolatry, which, though it was closely interwoven with all the domestic and civil institutions of every class of the inhabitants, upheld by the combined influence of a numerous body of priests, the arbitrary power of warlike chiefs, and the sanction of venerable antiquity, had been publicly and authoritatively prohibited by the king only a few months before their arrival. The motives which influenced the monarch of Hawaii in this decisive measure, the war it occasioned, and the consequences which ensued, are detailed in the following narrative. The missionaries could not but view it as a remarkable interposition of divine Providence in their favour, and a happy prelude to the introduction of that gospel which they had conveyed to their shores. They had naturally expected that their landing would be opposed by the institutions of a system, which, however degrading and oppressive in its influence, had presented more than human claims to the support of its adherents,-and to be withstood by a numerous and influential class of priests, whose craft would be endangered so soon as they should present the paramount claims of the true God to the homage of the heart and uniform obedience of the life. Instead of this, they found the laws of the Tabu entirely abrogated, and priests no longer existing as a distinct body, but merged in the other classes of the community. The whole nation was without any religion, and in this