their meaning, and likened them to some other abstraction. For example, the "moroqui" for number eight would have actually been , a small fish that is used as a bait, since "8" can look like a simple drawing of a fish.

A British expedition led by Captain James Cook visited the island four years later, and had a Tahitian interpreter with him, who, while recognizing some Polynesian words (up to 17 were written down), was not able to converse with the islanders in