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course of the operation; one which they some times used being made of a shark’s tooth, and another having teeth like a saw. They had them also of different sizes, to suit the different parts of the work. “While I was undergoing this operation, although the pain was most acute, I never either moved or uttered a sound; but my comrades moaned dreadfully. Although the operators were very quick and dexterous, I was four hours under their hands; and during the oper ation Aimy’s eldest daughter several times wiped the blood from my face with some dressed flax. After it was over she led me to the river, that I might wash myself, for it had made me completely blind, and then conducted me to a great fire. They now returned us all our clothes, with the exception of our shirts, which the women kept for themselves, wearing them, as we observed, with the fronts behind. “We were now not only tattooed, but what they called tabooed,* the meaning of which is, made sacred, or forbidden to touch any provisions of any kind with our hands. This state of things lasted for three days, during which time we were fed by the daughters of the chiefs, with the same victuals, and out of the same baskets, as the chiefs themselves, and the persons who had tattooed us. In three days, the swelling which had been produced by the operation had greatly subsided, and I began to ‘tapp’d.