And now, before I relate anything concerning our visit to this island, which proved to be so full of adventure, I ask permission to copy here that which I read many years afterward, and this I do because it would be impossible otherwise to describe the beautiful place--the most beautiful I have ever seen. That which follows was written by a sailor[1] who spent many months on the island, and was fortunate in being able to describe in a most entertaining manner everything he saw, which is by long odds more than I can do. "The cluster comprising the islands of Roohka, Ropo, and Nukuheva were altogether unknown to the world until the year 1791, when they were discovered by Captain Ingraham of Boston, nearly two centuries after the discovery of the adjacent islands by the agent of the Spanish viceroy. "Nukuheva is the most important of these islands, being the only one at which ships are much in the habit of touching, and is celebrated as being the place where the adventurous Captain Porter refitted his ships during the late war between England and the United States, and whence he sallied out upon the large whaling fleet then sailing under the enemy's flag in the surrounding seas. This island is about twenty miles in length and nearly as many in breadth. It has three good harbors on its coast; the largest and best of which is called by the people living in its vicinity, 'Tyohee,' and by Captain Porter was denominated Massachusetts Bay. Among the adverse tribes dwelling about the shores of the other bays, and by all voyagers, it is generally known by the name bestowed upon the island itself--Nukuheva. "In the bay of Nukuheva was the anchorage we desired to reach. We had perceived the loom of the mountains about sunset; so that after running all night with a very light breeze, we found ourselves close in with the island the next morning; but as the bay we sought lay on its farther side, we were obliged to sail some distance along the shore, catching, as we proceeded, short glimpses of blooming valleys, deep glens, waterfalls, and waving groves, hidden here and there by projecting and rocky headlands, every moment opening to the view some new and startling scene of beauty.