PACIFIC AND BEERING'S STRAIT. 221 



CHAP. 

 VII. 



Feb. 



was not before known, I named Byam Martin Island, 

 in compliment to Sir Thomas Byam Martin, K.C.B., 

 the Comptroller of the Navy. 1826 



As we neared the shore the natives made several 

 fires. Shortly afterwards three of them launched a 

 canoe, and paddled fearlessly to the barge, which 

 brought them to the ship. Instead of the deep- 

 coloured uncivilized Indians inhabiting the coral 

 islands in general, a tall well-made person, compara- 

 tively fair, and handsomely tattooed, ascended the 

 side, and, to our surprise, familiarly accosted us in 

 the Otaheitan manner. The second had a hog and 

 a cock tattooed upon his breast — animals almost 

 unknown among the islands of Eastern Polynesia; 

 and the third wore a turban of blue nankeen. Either 

 of these were distinctions sufficient to excite con- 

 siderable interest, as they convinced us they were 

 not natives of the island before us, but had either 

 been left there, or drifted away from some other 

 island : the latter supposition was the most probable, 

 as they described themselves to have undergone 

 great privation and suffering, by which many of 

 their companions had lost their lives, and their canoe 

 to have been wrecked upon the island ; and that 

 they and their friends on shore were anxious to em- 

 bark in the ship, and return to Otaheite. A little 

 suspicion was at first attached to this account, as it 

 seemed impossible for a canoe to reach their present 

 asylum without purposely paddling towards it ; as 

 Byam Martin Island, unlike Wateo, upon which 

 Omai found his countrymen, is situated six hundred 

 miles from Otaheite, in the direction of the trade- 

 wind. We could not doubt, however, that they 

 were natives of that place, as they mentioned the 



