36 cook's SECOND VOYAGE JULY, 



seeing broken water in the one we were steering for, 

 I gave up the design, and bore up, in order to go 

 without, or to the south of them. Before this could 

 be accomplished, it fell calm, and we were left to the 

 mercy of the current, close to the isles, where we 

 could find no soundings with a line of an hundred 

 and eighty fathoms. We had now lands or islands 

 in every direction, and were not able to count the 

 number which lay round us. The mountain on 

 Paoom was seen over the east end of Apee, bearing 

 N.N.W. at eight o'clock. A breeze at S.E. re- 

 lieved us from the anxiety the calm had occasioned ; 

 and we spent the night making short boards. 



The night before we came out of Port Sandwich, 

 two reddish fish, about the size of large bream, and 

 not unlike them, were caught with hook and line. 

 On these fish most of the officers, and some of the 

 petty officers, dined the next day. The night fol- 

 lowing, every one who had eaten of them was 

 seized with violent pains in the head and bones, 

 attended with a scorching heat all over the skin, 

 and numbness in the joints. There remained no 

 doubt that this was occasioned by the fish being of 

 a poisonous nature, and having communicated its 

 bad effects to all who partook of them ; even to the 

 hogs and dogs. One of the former died about 

 sixteen hours after ; it was not long before one of 

 the latter shared the same fate ; and it was a week or 

 ten days, before all the gentlemen recovered. These 

 must have been the same sort of fish mentioned by 

 Quiros # , under the name of Pargos, which poisoned 

 the crews of his ships, so that it was some time before 

 they recovered ; and we should, doubtless, have been 

 in the same situation, had more of them been eaten. 



At day-break on the 25th, we made a short stretch 

 to the east of Shepherd's Isles till after sun-rise, 

 when, seeing no more land in that direction, we 

 tacked and stood for the island we had seen in the 

 south, having a gentle breeze at S.E. We passed 



* Dalrymple's Collection of Voyages, vol. i. p. 140, 141. 



