224 



NEW BRITAIN. 



being the neareft place they could be fupphed from. Among 

 the birds were parrots, cockatoos, pigeons, crows, and abun- 

 dance of other fpecies. There was alfo fifli in plenty. How 

 unfortunate were our convi(ft:s, that this rich illand was not 

 thought of as the place of their involuntary retreat. 



A VERY little to the north of Montagu Bay was difcovered, 

 in 1767, another flrcight, of fmall breadth, but which fevers 

 New Britain into two iflands, leaving the northern the largeft. 

 It was not Dampier^s, fortune to difcover it ; he palTed it by, and, 

 Cape Orford. in Lat. 5' 25' fouth, faw a headland he named Cape Orford. 

 The country continued very mountanous, full of people; the 

 men armed with lances, their head gay with feathers ; the 

 women had no fort of ornaments, and nothing to hide their 

 nakednefs except a bunch of green leaves behind and before. 

 There were tame hogs in great abundance, which ran about 

 near the hovels of the natives. 



Within cape Orford was an inlet, which Dampier fuppofing 



to be a great bay, named by him that of St. George, and a cape on 



the northern fide, in Lat. 5° fouth, Long. 152* 19' eaft, corre- 



Cape St. fpondent to cape Orford, he called cape St. George. Thefe two 



CjEORCE. 



headlands proved the diftinguiihing mark of the entrance into a 

 ftreight, which divided New Britain into a fecond ifland. This 

 difcovery v\'as made by that able officer Captain Carteret, Sep~ 

 tember 9th 1767, on his difaftrous return from the South Seas. 

 When he got into St. George''^ bay, he found fo flrong a current 

 to the north-weft, that he could not return to purfue Dampiefs 

 track. Captain Carteret, foon after he doubled cape St. George, 

 met with feveral iflands in the fouthern fide of the ftreights ; 

 9 the 



