The violent death of Cook undermined prelapsarian myths of the Pacific but reinforced that essential line, at once fundamental and fragile, dividing civilization from savagery. In killing the great navigator the islanders could be seen as having conformed or reverted to type; such actions were in character. To turn one's back on civilization, however, was inexplicable and scandalous. White savages were immeasurably more reprehensible than black or brown ones because they chose to throw off the restraints of civilization. Native backsliding, as we shall see in the next chapter, frustrated the missionaries but was to be expected. Opting for savagery, however, turned accepted categories inside out and hierarchies on their head.

The type of the white savage in Pacific writing was the beachcomber, that anomalous figure who jumped ship, was shipwrecked or escaped from a convict settlement and crossed the beach to become a participating member of an island culture. Unlike the sailors or traders who merely visited and therefore remained strangers, beachcombers settled and were accepted. This acceptance depended, in large measure, on conforming to the social pattern of their hosts. Many beachcombers, already alienated from their home cultures, were prepared to try. As a result they were detested by the official representatives of European culture in the South Pacific.