The island is very well cultivated, except in a few places; and there are some others which, though they appear to lie waste, are only left to recover the strength exhausted by constant culture; for we frequently saw the natives at work upon these spots to plant them again. The plantations consist chiefly of yams and plantains. Many of them are very extensive, and often inclosed with neat fences of reed, disposed obliquely across each other, about six feet high. Within these we often saw other fences of less compass surrounding the houses of the principal people. The bread-fruit and cocoa-nut trees are interspersed with little order, but chiefly near the habitations of the natives; and the other parts of the island, especially toward the sea, and about the sides of the lake, are covered with trees and bushes of a most luxuriant growth; the last place having a great many mangroves, and the first a vast number of the _faitanoo_ trees already mentioned. There seem to be no rocks or stones of any kind about the island that are not coral, except in one place to the right of the sandy beach, where there is a rock twenty or thirty feet high, of a calcareous stone of a yellowish colour, and a very close texture. But even about that place, which is the highest part of the land, are large pieces of the same coral rock that composes the shore. Besides walking frequently up into the country, which we were permitted to do without interruption, we sometimes amused ourselves in shooting wild ducks not unlike the widgeon, which are very numerous upon the salt lake, and the pool where we got our water. In these excursions we found the inhabitants had often deserted their houses to come down to the trading place, without entertaining any suspicion that strangers rambling about would take away or destroy any thing that belonged to them. But though, from this circumstance, it might be supposed that the greater part of the natives were sometimes collected at the beach, it was impossible to form any accurate computation of their number, as the continual resort of visitors from other islands mixing with them might easily mislead one. However, as there was never to appearance, about a thousand persons collected at one time, it would perhaps be sufficient to allow double that number for the whole island.