IIB4(vi) George Forster On the stone statues and wood carvings of Easter Island, March 1774
The stone statues of Easter Island have some claim to be among the most striking works of non‐European art encountered on any of the eighteenth‐century voyages of exploration. Although they had been seen from the sea by the Dutch navigator Roggeveen, Cook’s crew were the first to encounter them at close quarters. It is telling, however, that George Forster, precisely because they are figurative, and hence approach the territory of ‘Art’, is inclined to a negative judgement. Whereas the baskets and clubs he saw at Tonga would stand comparison with the best of European artisanal workmanship, Forster feels that any European artist would be ‘ashamed’ of the Easter Island stone figures for their lack of mimetic fidelity. However, a little further on in his account, Forster’s sympathy for the hardships of life on Easter Island leads him to a more positive assessment of some other, smaller, figurative works in wood which, he concedes, may show a glimmering of a ‘taste for the arts’. As he notes in conclusion, one of them, a lifelike carving of a human hand, was subsequently deposited by his father in the collection of the British Museum. ‘Mahine’, who is mentioned in this connection, was a young Tahitian who joined the Resolution in September 1773 intending to travel to England. In the event he sailed to New Zealand, Easter Island and the Marquesas, but left the ship when it returned to Tahiti in June 1774. A large painting of the stone statues by the voyage artist, William Hodges, who accompanied Forster and others around the island to make a visual record, is now in the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich, London. This extract is taken from George Forster, A Voyage Round the World [1777], edited by Nicholas Thomas and Oliver Berghof, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2000, vol. 1, pp. 305–6, 309–10 and 312–14.
After staying among the natives for some time on the beach, we began to walk into the country … About fifteen yards from the landing‐place we saw a perpendicular wall of square hewn stones, about a foot and a half or two feet long, and one foot broad. Its greatest height was about seven or eight feet, but it gradually sloped on both sides, and its length might be about twenty yards. A remarkable circumstance was the junction of these stones, which were laid after the most excellent rules of art, fitting in such a manner as to make a durable piece of architecture. The stone itself of which they are cut is not of great hardness being a blackish brown cavernous and brittle stony lava. The ground rose from the water’s side upwards; so that another wall, parallel to the first, about twelve yards from it and facing the country, was not above two or three feet high. The whole area between the two walls was filled up with soil and covered with grass. About fifty yards farther to the south there was another elevated area, of which the surface was paved with square stones exactly similar to those which formed the walls. In the midst of this area, there was a pillar consisting of a single stone, which represented a human figure to the waist, about twenty feet high, and upwards of five feet wide. The workmanship of this figure was rude, and spoke the arts in their infancy. The eyes, nose, and mouth were scarcely marked on a lumpish ill‐shaped head; and the ears, which were excessively long, quite in the fashion of the country, were better executed than any other part, though a European artist would have been ashamed of them. The neck was clumsy and short, and the shoulders and arms very slightly represented. […]
About sun‐set we left the watering‐place, and walked to the cove where our boat lay at a grapnel. In our way we passed over the area on which the single pillar before‐mentioned was placed. A few natives who still accompanied us, made signs that we should descend, and walk in the grass at the foot of the pedestal; but seeing that we did not care to understand their gestures, they made no other attempt to oppose our progress. We put some questions to the most intelligent persons among them, concerning the nature of these stones, and from what we could understand, we concluded that they were monuments erected to the memory of some of their areekees, or kings … To the westward of the cove, there was a range of three pillars, standing on a very large elevated area or pedestal. This range the natives distinguished by the name of hanga‐roa, and the single pillar they called obeena. About ten or twelve people were seated at a little distance from the last, round a small fire, over which they had roasted a few potatoes. These served for their supper, and they offered us some of them as we passed by. We were much surprised with this instance of hospitality in so poor a country, especially when we compared it to the customs of civilized nations, who have almost entirely laid aside all tender feelings for the wants of their fellow‐creatures. […]
The scarcity of cloth among them was extremely great, most of the people being forced to go naked; but this did not prevent their selling what little cloth they had in exchange for that of Taheitee. The desire of possessing this cloth prompted them to expose to sale several articles which perhaps they would not have parted with so easily under other circumstances. Among these were their different caps or head‐dresses, their necklaces, ornaments for the ear, and several human figures, made of narrow pieces of wood about eighteen inches or two feet long, and wrought in a much neater and more proportionate manner than we could have expected, after seeing the rude sculpture of the statues. They were made to represent persons of both sexes; the features were not very pleasing, and the whole figure was much too long to be natural; however, there was something characteristic in them, which shewed a taste for the arts. The wood of which they were made was finely polished, close‐grained, and of a dark‐brown, like that of the casuarina. But as we had not yet seen this tree growing here, we eagerly expected the return of our party, hoping they would make some discoveries to explain this circumstance. Mahine was most pleased with these carved human figures, the workman of which much excelled those of the e Tees in his country, and he purchased several of them, assuring us they would be greatly valued at Taheitee. As he took great pains to collect these curiosities, he once met with a figure of a woman’s hand, carved of a yellowish wood, nearly of the natural size. Upon examination, its fingers were all bent upwards, as they are in the action of dancing at Taheitee, and its nails were represented very long, extending at least three fourths of an inch beyond the fingers’ end. The wood of which it was made was the rare perfume‐wood of Taheitee, with the chips of which they communicate fragrance to their oils. We had neither seen this wood growing, nor observed the custom of wearing long nails at this island, and therefore were at a loss to conceive how this piece of well‐executed carving could be met with there; we hoped, however, to unravel this circumstance also at the return of our party. Mahine afterwards presented this piece to my father, who has in his turn made a present of it the British Museum.
IIB5 Ignatius Sancho (1729–80) and Laurence Sterne (1713–68) An exchange of letters
By a series of extraordinary coincidences, the baby claimed by an early biographer to have been born on a slave ship during the Middle Passage from Africa to the Caribbean (but who was more probably born in Africa itself) became first a manservant to the duke of Montagu and second, a significant figure in literary and artistic London during the late eighteenth century. Already a published author of four collections of music, towards the end of his life Ignatius Sancho became celebrated for his letter‐writing, both to friends, privately, and to newspapers, and a prominent figure in the first stirrings of the movement to abolish slavery in British colonies. He was, that is to say, a man of ‘sentiment’ rather than a ‘noble savage’, the still‐prevalent stereotype for people of colour at that time. His collected letters, bearing on their frontispiece an engraving after his portrait by Gainsborough, were published within two years of his death. The first, and arguably most significant letter was to Laurence Sterne,