📔 Omoo

The people of the southeasterly clusters—concerning whom, however, but little is known—have a bad name as cannibals; and for that reason their hospitality is seldom taxed by the mariner.

As for the mob cap, not a fig did I care for it; but, to be taken for anything but a cavalier, by the ringleted one, was absolutely unendurable.

All balmy from the groves of Tahiti, came an indolent air, cooled by its transit over the waters; and grateful under foot, was the damp and slightly yielding beach, from which the waves seemed just retired.

The missionaries have prepared a sort of penal tariff to facilitate judicial proceedings. [...] The judge being provided with a book, in which all these matters are cunningly arranged, the thing is vastly convenient. For instance: a crime is proved,—say, bigamy; turn to letter B.—and there you have it. Bigamy:—forty days on the Broom Road, and twenty mats for the queen. Read the passage aloud, and sentence is pronounced.