1774. ROUND THE WORLD. 541 



and leaping on one side ; thus the blow would fall to 

 the ground. The spear or dart was parried, by fixing 

 the point of a spear in the ground right before them, 

 holding it in an inclined position, more or less ele- 

 vated, according to the part of the body they saw their 

 antagonist intended to make a push, or throw his dart 

 at, and by moving the hand a little to the right or 

 left, either the one or the other was easily turned 

 off* with great ease. I thought that when one com- 

 batant had parried off the blows, &c. of the other, he 

 did not use the advantage which seemed to me to 

 accrue. As, for instance ; after he had parried off a 

 dart, he still stood on the defensive, and suffered his 

 antagonist to take up another, when I thought there 

 was time to run him through the body. These com- 

 batants had no superfluous dress upon them ; an un- 

 necessary piece of cloth or two which they had on 

 when they began, were presently torn off by the by- 

 standers, and given to some of our gentlemen pre- 

 sent. This being over, the fleet departed ; not in 

 any order, but as fast as they could be got afloat ; and 

 we went with Otoo to one of his dock-yards, where 

 the two large pahies or canoes were building, each of 

 which was an hundred and eight feet long, they were 

 almost ready to launch, and were intended to make 

 one joint double pahie or canoe. The king begged 

 of me a grappling and rope, to which I added an 

 English jack and pendant (with the use of which he 

 was well acquainted), and desired the pahie might be 

 called Britannia. This he very readily agreed to ; 

 and she was named accordingly. After this he gave 

 me a hog, and a turtle of about sixty pounds weight, 

 which was put privately into our boat ; the giving it 

 away not being agreeable to some of the great lords 

 about him, who were thus deprived of a feast He 

 likewise would have given me a large shark they had 

 prisoner in a creek (some his fins being cut off so 

 that he could not make his escape), but the fine pork 

 and fish we had got at this isle, had spoiled our pa- 



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