390 cook's first voyage feb. 



the Sound, and purchased a considerable quantity of 

 split and half-dried fish, for sea-stores. The people 

 here confirmed all that the old man had told us 

 concerning the streight and the country, and about 

 noon I took leave of them : some of them seemed to 

 be sorry, and others glad, that we were going : the 

 fish which I had bought they sold freely, but there 

 were some who showed manifest signs of disappro- 

 bation. As we returned to the ship, some of us made 

 an excursion along the shore to the northward, to 

 traffic with the natives for a farther supply of fish ; 

 in which, however, they had no great success. In 

 the evening we got every thing off from the shore, 

 as I intended to sail in the morning, but the wind 

 would not permit. 



On the 4th, while we were waiting for a wind, we 

 amused ourselves by fishing, and gathering shells and 

 seeds of various kinds ; and early in the morning of 

 the 5th, we cast off the hawser, hove short on the 

 bower, and carried the kedge-anchor out, in order to 

 warp the ship out of the cove, which having done, 

 about two o'clock in the afternoon, we hove up the 

 anchor and got under sail ; but the wind soon failing, 

 we were obliged to come to an anchor again a little 

 above Motuara, When we were under sail, our old 

 man, Topaa, came on board to take his leave of us ; 

 and as we were still desirous of making farther en- 

 quiries whether any memory of Tasman had been 

 preserved among these people, Tupia was directed 

 to ask him whether he had ever heard that such a 

 vessel as ours had before visited the country. To 

 this he replied in the negative ; but said that his an- 

 cestors had told him there had once come to this 

 place a small vessel, from a distant country, called 

 Ulimaroa, in which were four men, who, upon their 

 coming on shore, were all killed : upon being asked 

 where this distant land lay, he pointed to the north- 

 ward. Of Ulimaroa we had heard something before, 

 from the people about the Bay of Islands, who said 

 that their ancestors had visited it ; and Tupia had 



