surfresearch.com.au  hms seringapatam  : easter island, 1830

In 1915 Katherine Routledge reported the use of pora (note the spelling) in the race of the Bird Man Cult.
See
1915 Katherine Routledge : Easter and Pitcairn Islands, 1915.

A reconstructed race of the Bird man cult, apparently based on Routledge's account,  was filmed by National Geographic for their documentary
Easter Island Underworld (2011) with the contestants effectively paddling on pora/para.

See
National Geographic: Easter Island Underworld(2010), promo, 01:09.
http://natgeotv.com/asia/easter-island-underworld
http://knowledge.ca/program/national-geographic-specials-easter-island-underworld

Lisiansky descibes the para as " four feet and a half long, and fifteen inches and a half broad, consisted of sugar-cane, platted over with rushes", - page 59.
See
1804 Urey Lisiansky: Easter Island (Rapa Nui)

On page 79, he also notes:
"What Waldegrave observed as 'two outriggers on one side' is unique for Rapanui and rare for Polynesia (see Metraux. 1940: 207-218)."

The design of the Rapanui canoes was probably not unique.
The full description is "two outriggers on one side and a long piece connecting the outriggers at the end." - page 72.
It is likely that the terminolgy is confusing and Waldegrave's "two outriggers" are the spars connecting the ama (the outrigger float) to the main hull.
These are called 'iako in Hawaiian and kiato in Maori, with similar words in other Polynesian language.
In Micronesian languages, the term aka is used.
The ama is the " long piece connecting the outriggers at the end", that is the craft was of standard outrigger design.

- wikipedia : Outrigger canoe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outrigger_canoe

Page 68
...
There are two separate accounts of this voyage to the South Pacific: Captain Waldegrave's official report to the Admiral and the Admiralty in London, an autograph manuscript copy of which remains in the possession of his descendant the Earl Waldegrave and of which extracts were published in the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society (Waldegrave 1833); and Lieutenant John Orlebar's journal, published in London in 1833 in a limited edition (reprinted 1976).

Page 69
...
The calling of H.M.S. Seringapatam was not included among the extracts Captain Waldegrave published in the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society (Waldegrave 1833), but it was detailed in his official report to the Admiral and the Admiralty.
Its reproduction in the unpublished manuscript "Copy of my report sent to the Admiral and Admiralty, H.M.S. Seringapatam in the Pacific," which the Countess Waldegrave has carefully transcribed from the original in her possession and has so graciously agreed to place at the disposal of Polynesian scholars, is given here unabridged.
Captain Waldegrave's orthography is maintained, including his own autograph notes penned in the margins, but I have edited the punctuation somewhat for better fluency.

March 5th at 11 P.M. we shortened sail and hove too, on the morning of the 6th at 5 A.M. we bore up and saw Easter Island, ...

Page 70

Figure 1
(Title ?)

Page 71

FIGURE 2. "South 'side of Easter Island," The second hitherto unknown watercolor of Rapanui by A.Mathews, painted at 11 A. M. on 6 March 1830, on board H.M.S. Seringapatam at a position ca. six miles south of Rano Kau volcano, with the islets Motu Nui, Motu 'Iti, and the crag Motu Kaokao on the far left and Poike peninsula on the far right. (Reproduced with the kind permission of the Earl and Countess Waldegrave.)

Page 72

Shortly after we anchored, a native man swam on board.
He made a very loud noise, shouting excessively.
Several others soon followed. In one hour more than two hundred of both sexes had swam on board and many others hung on to the ship's side.
Not being admitted they shouted, jumped, danced, appearing to have great confidence in us.
...
They swam well, swimming to and from the ship, distance a mile and a half from the shore; and a few were supported by a bar of rushes between the legs, each carrying a small flat basket of sweet potatoes, sugar or plantain.

We saw five canoes made of drift wood, very slight.
Ten feet long by fourteen inches wide, with two outriggers on one side and a long piece connecting the outriggers at the end.
They held two or three persons.
...
About three o'clock we compelled the natives to leave the ship.
We rowed towards the beach, where were assembled near three hundred persons.
About five o'clock another party attempted to land but were prevented by the very high surf as the boat approached the shore.
A loud shout was raised, the natives ran from every direction to the landing place.
About twenty ...

Page 73

... women and ten men swam to the boat.
They hung on to the boat, various little presents were made.

Page 74

...
In contrast to those of Captain Waldegrave, his impressions of the calling at Rapanui were subsequently published (Orlebar 1833). They are included here as a complement and counterpart to Waldegrave's account:

Page 75

On March 6th, at five in the morning, we observed Easter Island, ...
...
The shore was lined with people, and long before we anchored, the ship was surrounded by shoals of the swimming naked natives.
We were anxious for them to come on board, but as there were nearly two hundred in the water, the captain prudently would only allow forty to be on board at a time, to effect which we were obliged to use some harshness.

Page 76
...
For hours afterwards there were hundreds swimming round the ship, and making every good-tempered endeavour to get on board; and it was not till sunset that they returned to the shore.
Captain Waldegrave made two attempts to land, but could not succeed from the heavy surf running on the rocky beach, and as we sailed the same evening, we are obliged to remain satisfied with the little we could observe of the island by the aid of our spy-glasses and our acquaintance with the natives on board.

Page 77
...
Their food must be nearly confined to vegetables, for fowls are the only animals on the island, (18) and even their supply of fish which are abundant in these seas must be very precarious, as their contrivance for catching them is awkward and they possess only three canoes.
The water seemed their native element; the ease with which both sexes swam, their swiftness, and their remaining in for hours without being fatigued, astonished every body; a few of the women had a bundle of rushes which helped to buoy them up, but it was quite confined to their sex.

Page 78

Page 79
...
The Rapanui' s celebrated natations, which especially impressed young Orlebar, were facilitated by small para, "floaters" of bulrush mats, a custom first witnessed by Lisiansky in 1804 (1814:58); Orlebar wrongly assumes this to be a strictly female custom.
Orlebar noticed only three canoes, Waldegrave five.
In 1825 Beechey had also witnessed three canoes onshore (1831, 1:54); two years later Cuming had seen an indeterminate number (Fischer 1991:305).
As early as 1722 Roggeveen had, like Waldegrave, estimated the length of these driftwood canoes to be ten feet (1908: 19).
What Waldegrave observed as "two outriggers on one side" is unique for Rapanui and rare for Polynesia (see Metraux. 1940: 207-218).

Page 79

Page 83

Fischer, Steven Roger
1991 "Hugh Cuming's Account of an Anchorage at Rapanui (Easter Island), November 27-8, 1827."
Journal of the Polynesian Society 100 (3): 303-315.
 

Page 84

Fischer, Steven Roger
1991 "Hugh Cuming's Account of an Anchorage at Rapanui (Easter Island), November 27-8, 1827."
Journal of the Polynesian Society 100 (3): 303-315.

Orlebar, John
1833 A Midshipman's Journal, on board HM.S. Seringapatam, during the year, 1830; containing brief observations on Pitcairn's Island, and Other Islands in the South Sea.
London: Whittaker, Treacher, and Co. Reprint San Diego: Tofua Press, 1976.

Roggeveen, Jacob
1908 "The Voyage of Captain Don Felipe Gonzalez, Preceded by an Extract from Mijnheer Jacob Roggeveen's Official Log of His Discovery of and Visit to Easter Island in 1722."
Transcribed, translated and edited by Bolton Glanvill Corney. Hakluyt Society (Cambridge), 2d ser., 13: xv-lxxvii.

Waldegrave, William
n.d. "Copy of my report sent to the Admiral and Admiralty, H.M.S. Seringapatam in the Pacific."
Unpublished autograph manuscript in the private collection of the Earl and Countess Waldegrave, Chewton House, Chewton Mendip, Bath, Great Britain.

1833 "Extracts from a Private Journal kept on board H.M.S. Seringapatam, in the Pacific, 1830."
Journal of the Royal Geographical Society (London) 3: 168-196.

Volume 100 1991 > Volume 100, No. 3 > Hugh Cuming's account of an anchorage at Rapanui (Easter Island), November 27-8, 1827, by Steven Roger Fischer, p 303 - 316
http://www.jps.auckland.ac.nz/document/?wid=3037

Among the manuscripts in the Mitchell Library, Sydney, is the unpublished ‘Journal of a Voyage from Valparaiso to the Society and the Adjacent Islands performed in the Schooner Discoverer, Samuel Grimwood Master, in the years 1827 and 1828, by Hugh Cuming’ (A 1336, CY Reel 194, 145 frames). Between its humble covers lies a veritable treasure-trove of early 19th century information on an impressive list of Polynesian islands. Pages 7-12 (frames 14-9) of this journal include a detailed account of an anchorage at Hangaroa (Cook Bay), Rapanui, effected November 27-8, 1827. Because such early reports about Rapanui are so rare, and, in particular, as this one is exceedingly wealthy in significant observations, it is reproduced here verbatim.

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