Dancing is one of the most common amusements in the islands of the South sea. The dances in which the women join are generally slow and graceful, accompanied by a variety of motions with the head, body, and limbs. In most of these dances, little attention is paid to decorum. Sometimes forty or fifty women dance together in a solid square, changing their attitudes every moment; sometimes all squatting down, and then all springing up at the same moment. A musician accompanies the dancers, who beats a small drum, made of a cocoa-nut shell covered with shark’s skin. The women likewise strike pieces of wood or notched reeds together in cadence, like the castanets of more civilized nations. In addition to this they often wear around their ankles a network of shells, or dog’s teeth, which rattle as they dance. They have songs descriptive of war, or love, or beautiful scenery. These are generally sung alternately by both sexes, in a sort of recitative. The following are extracts from a favorite song among the Tonga people: “The women said to us, let us repair to the back of the island to contemplate the setting sun; there let us listen to the warbling of birds and the cooing of the wood-pigeon. We will gather flowers from the burial place at Matawto, and then bathe in the sea, and anoint ourselves in the sun with sweet-scented oil, and will weave in garlands the flowers gathered at Matawto. Oh, how much happier shall we be than when engaged in the wearisome and insipid affairs of life! How troublesome are the young men begging for wreaths of flowers, while they say in their flattery, ‘See how charming these young girls look coming from Licoo! How beautiful is their skin, diffusing around a fragrance like the flowery precipice of Mataloco!’” It is a common amusement with the women of Polynesia to throw up five balls in such a manner as to keep four perpetually in the air. They are thrown with the left hand, and caught with the right. The players at the same time chant verses, with the cadence of which their motions keep perfect time. Sometimes seven or eight join together in this recreation. Swimming is their favorite diversion, and they show an astonishing degree of courage and expertness in the practice of it. Women will often, for mere sport, frolic in places where such a tremendous surf breaks on the shore, that the boldest European swimmer would not dare to venture within its power. If beads, or nails, be thrown into the sea, they will dive after them with incredible velocity, and seldom fail to bring them up. If a shark makes his appearance when women are swimming, it is said the playful water nymphs surround him, and, if they can once get him into the surf, fairly drive him on shore; and even if the monster escapes from them, they continue their sport, without any apparent fear of danger.