ABSTRACT
On an island only two miles by one, no one, neither assassin nor victim, could be more than a mile away from the main settlement located in the centre. The disappearance of three Polynesians who were planning to kill at least some of the European men must have generated a great deal of tension. The rebellion, which happened in autumn 1791 was over, but within two years of landing and starting their community murder had been threatened and men executed. The revenge of the Europeans had been severe. The Polynesian men had been obliged to purchase their own lives by executing two of their own kind. In September 1793 the Polynesians again attempted to redress their wrongs. The way the plot was planned and accomplished demonstrates that the European men assumed that they had broken the spirit of the Tahitians and had nothing to fear from them.
