But to return from the dead to the living. The late festival had drawn together, as I had every reason to believe, the whole population of the vale, and consequently I was enabled to make some estimate with regard to its numbers. I should imagine that there were about two thousand inhabitants in Typee; and no number could have been better adapted to the extent of the valley. The valley is some nine miles in length, and may average one in breadth, the houses being distributed at wide intervals throughout its whole extent, principally, however, towards the head of the vale. There are no villages. The houses stand here and there in the shadow of the groves, or are scattered along the banks of the winding stream; their golden-hued bamboo sides and gleaming white thatch, forming a beautiful contrast to the perpetual verdure in which they are embowered. There are no roads of any kind in the valley. Nothing but a labyrinth of footpaths, twisting and turning among the thickets without end. CHAPTER XXVI The social condition and general character of the Typees. There seemed to be no rogues of any kind in Typee. In the darkest nights the natives slept securely, with all their worldly wealth around them, in houses the doors of which were never fastened. The disquieting ideas of theft or assassination never disturbed them. Each islander reposed beneath his own palmetto-thatching, or sat under his own bread-fruit, with none to molest or alarm him. There was not a padlock in the valley, nor anything that answered the purpose of one: still there was no community of goods. This long spear, so elegantly carved and highly polished, belongs to Warmoonoo—it is far handsomer than the one which old Marheyo so greatly prizes—it is the most valuable article belonging to its owner. And yet I have seen it leaning against a cocoa-nut tree in the grove, and there it was found when sought for. Here is a sperm-whale tooth, graven all over with cunning devices—it is the property of Kurluna. It is the most precious of the damsel’s ornaments. In her estimation, its price is far above rubies; and yet there hangs the dental jewel, by its cord of braided bark, in the girl’s house, which is far back in the valley; the door is left open, and all the inmates have gone off to bathe in the stream.[5] So much for the respect in which such matters are held in Typee. As to the land of the valley, whether it was the joint property of its inhabitants, or whether it was parcelled out among a certain number of landed proprietors, who allowed everybody to roam over it as much as they pleased, I never could ascertain. At any rate, musty parchments and title-deeds there were none in the island; and I am half inclined to believe that its inhabitants hold their broad valleys in fee simple from nature herself.