When I went on half-pay, I placed Punch in the stables. The women servants took a fancy to him; but Punch, whatever he may have thought of the women, had no love for the head groom, in whose arm he made his teeth meet. So I found him a billet in a hairdresser's shop, which bore the legend, "Hairbrushing by machinery." Punch was the machinery. I saw him at it, turning a wheel in the window. I never saw him again, and know not what became of him. {87} CHAPTER IX THE CRUISE OF H.M.S. _GALATEA_ (_Continued_) III. TAHITI AND THE SANDWICH ISLANDS We arrived at Tahiti in June, 1869. Here is the most lovely climate in the world. The inhabitants never seemed to do any work, with the single exception of carrying bananas. In this exercise they were extraordinarily expert, bearing enormous weights upon the shoulders, the skin of which becomes hard like leather. I considered myself to be fairly strong; but when I tried to carry one of the masses of bananas under which the natives march swiftly all day long, up hill and down, I found that I was able to carry it only for a short distance, and with difficulty, on level ground. The people were perfectly delightful. We went ashore and lived among them; and it was then that I understood how it was that the men of the _Bounty_ mutinied. The fact was that those discontented mariners could not bear to leave islands so delectable. I do not of course, desire to justify their very reprehensible conduct. All I say is that I can understand the strength of its motive. It was simply the desire to remain in an earthly paradise which inspired the men of the _Bounty_ when they left Otaheite in April, 1789, to set Captain Bligh adrift in an open boat, with the nineteen men who stayed by him, and a small stock of provisions. The captain and his men made an astonishing voyage of nearly 4000 miles, and fetched up at the island of Timor, south of the Malaccas, in the following June. Some of the mutineers were subsequently {88} brought to justice in the year 1792. Six of them were condemned and three were executed. In 1814 it was discovered that ten among the mutineers had colonised Pitcairn Island.