*224 cook's voyage to fep.. 



rica to windward, where the Spaniards have been 

 settled for more than two hundred years, during 

 which long period of time shipwrecks must have fre- 

 quently happened on its coasts? It cannot bethought 

 at all extraordinary, that partof such wrecks containing 

 iron should, by the easterly trade wind, be from time 

 to time cast upon islands scattered about this vast 

 ocean. The distance of Atooi from America, is no 

 argument against this supposition. But even if it 

 were, it would not destroy it. This ocean is tra- 

 versed every year by Spanish ships ; and it is obvious, 

 that, besides the accident of losing a mast and its ap- 

 pendages, casks with iron hoops, and many other 

 things containing iron, maybe thrown or may fall over- 

 board during so long a passage, and thus find their 

 way to land. But these are not mere conjectures 

 and possibilities, for one of my people actually did 

 see some wood in one of the houses at Wymoa, which 

 he judged to be fir. It was worm-eaten, and the 

 natives gave him to understand, that it had been 

 driven ashore by the waves of the sea ; and we had 

 their own express testimony, that they had got the in- 

 considerable specimens of iron found amongst them 

 from some place to the eastward. 



From this digression (if it can be called so), I 

 return to the observations made during our stay at 

 Atooi, and some account must now be given of their 

 canoes. These, in general, are about twenty-four feet 

 long, and have the bottom for the most part formed of 

 a single piece or log of wood, hollowed out to the thick- 

 ness of an inch or an inch and an half, and brought 

 to a point at each end. The sides consist of three 

 boards, each about an inch thick, and neatly fitted 

 and lashed to the bottom part. The extremities, 

 both at head and stern, are a little raised, and both 

 are made sharp, somewhat like a wedge, but they 

 flatten more abruptly, so that the two side-boards 

 join each other side by side for more than a foot. 

 But Mr. Webber's drawing will explain their construe- 



