and beard shaved, I ordered both his ears to be cut off and then
dismissed him.[2]

[Footnote 2: We cannot suffer this action to be passed over, without
expressing indignation at the cruelty and injustice that marked it.
Not even the fair reputation of Cook for meekness and humanity ought
to deter any one from affixing the proper term to such conduct. He had
no right to award so severe a treatment, even though he had authority
to take cognizance of the man's former and general character,
which, however, it is impossible, on any satisfactory principle, to
demonstrate. It was both the duty and the interest of Captain Cook to
conform to the established maxims and decisions of the people whom
he visited, which, whatever their own practice had been, would have
proved amply severe, as we have already had occasion to observe; but
no superiority of power on his part, could warrant the introduction of
unrecognized, and to these islanders it is probable, quite unheard-of
modes of punishment. A suspicion, some persons may think a very unfair
one, lurks in the mind of the writer, that the captain had rather
_forgotten himself_ during this voyage, and that presuming, in some
degree, on his established fame and consequence, be exercised a
greater latitude of power than his original caution and sense of
responsibility would have permitted him to hazard, at an earlier
period of his career. Such undoubtedly is human nature, and it can
by no means be interpreted as an unjust aspersion, that Cook was
not exempted from its common infirmities. Captain King, as we shall
afterwards find, makes a remark on his acquired confidence with
respect to the savages, in the latter part of his professional life,
which, though in the most delicate manner imaginable, seems very
readily to fall in with the suspicion now stated. As might have been
expected, the over severe, and, at all events, imprudently managed