316 NIMROD OF THE SEA; OR, 



where Captain Cook met his death, in 1778. It was with 

 the usual arrogance of the English breed of white men that 

 he underrated the character of these people for bravery, and 

 their haughty indisposition to submit to the strangers' tyr- 

 anny. The loss of this great explorer is to be deplored, but 

 no unprejudiced jury, even on the English account, could 

 render verdict other than " served him right." A small pile 

 of stones long marked the spot near which he fell, but the 

 hand of the spoiler was fast removing this trace, when an 

 English man-of-war placed a small sheet of copper, bearing 

 an inscription, on the trunk of the nearest cocoa-nut-tree. 

 The trunk of the tree was subsequently conveyed to England 

 and placed in the British Museum a very cheap monument 

 to England's greatest navigator and explorer. An old chief 

 who professed to remember the unfortunate occurrence, 

 pointed out the flat table of lava on which Cook was beaten 

 down, and with pantomimic action he endeavored to portray 

 the incidents, now running to and fro, now personating the 

 marines, with "boom, boom," and "ouTymitif and now show- 

 ing how his countrymen ran to the water and dipped their 

 cocoa-mat armor, thinking that the moisture would extin- 

 guish the bolt of flame which they saw issue from the dead- 

 ly gun. They supposed that the flame inflicted the deep 

 wound, and reasoned that a whetted mat might arrest the 

 death-dealing fire. Finding that this expedient failed, the 

 great dread possessed them that the white man was armed 

 with the sacred fire with which Pele had overcome the sea- 

 god, and brought their island home up through the great 

 deeps. This thought intimidated them more than the slaugh- 

 ter of their companions. But it must be admitted that they 

 manifested a cool courage and a ready presence of mind. 



Our entertainers announced that all was in readiness, and 

 we embarked in a double canoe. This structure was com- 

 posed, as its name implies, of two canoes placed parallel with 

 each other, about eight feet apart, and secured together by 



