104 cook's first voyage may, 



a few ships to lie in great security, and a small stream 

 of fresh water : I would have rowed into the lagoon, 

 but was prevented by shallows. We found several 

 bogs, and swamps of salt water, upon which, and by 

 the sides of the lagoon, grows the true mangrove, 

 such as is found in the West Indies, and the first of 

 the kind that we had met with. In the branches of 

 these mangroves there were many nests of a remark- 

 able kind of ant, that was as green as grass ; when 

 the branches were disturbed they came out in great 

 numbers, and punished the offender by a much 

 sharper bite than ever we had felt from the same 

 kind of animal before. Upon these mangroves also 

 we saw small green caterpillars in great numbers : 

 their bodies were thick set with hairs, and they were 

 ranged upon the leaves side by side like a file of 

 soldiers, to the number of twenty or thirty together : 

 when we touched them, we found that the hair of 

 their bodies had the quality of a nettle, and gave us 

 a much more acute, though less durable pain. The 

 country here is manifestly worse than about Botany 

 Bay : the soil is dry and sandy, but the sides of the 

 hills are covered with trees, which grow separately, 

 without underwood. We found here the tree that 

 yields a gum like the sanguis draconis ; but it is 

 somewhat different from the trees of the same kind 

 which we had seen before, for the leaves are longer, 

 and hang down like those of the weeping willow. 

 We found also much less gum upon them, which is 

 contrary to the established opinion, that the hotter 

 the climate the more gums exude. Upon a plant 

 also, which yielded a yellow gum, there was less 

 than upon the same kind of plant in Botany Bay. 

 Among the shoals and sand-banks we saw many 

 large birds, some in particular of the same kind that 

 we had seen in Botany Bay, much bigger than swans, 

 which W2 judged to be pelicans ; but they were so 

 shy that we could not get within gun-shot of them. 

 Upon the shore we saw a species of the bustard, one 



