352 CAPTAIN COOK'S VOYAGES 



northern isles are represented by him as abounding with 

 wood, I was in hopes, if I should find them, of getting a 

 supply of that article, which we now began to be in great 

 want of on board. 



!< With these views, I steered over for the American 

 coast, and on the 6th we got sight of it. 



" Pursuing our course, on the 9th we found ourselves 

 upon a coast covered with wood, an agreeable sight, to 

 which of late we had not been accustomed. Next morning, 

 being about a league from the west shore, I took two boats 

 and landed, attended by Mr. King, to seek wood and water. 

 Here we observed tracks of deer and foxes on the beach, 

 on which also lay a great quantity of drift-wood, and there 

 was no want of fresh water. I returned on board with an 

 intention to bring the ships to an anchor here, but the wind 

 then veering to north-east, I stretched over to the opposite 

 shore, in hopes of finding wood there also, and anchored 

 at eight o'clock in the evening, but next morning we found 

 it to be a peninsula united to the continent by a low neck 

 of land, on each side of which the coast forms a bay, which 

 obtained the name of Cape Denbigh. 



" Several people were seen upon the peninsula, and one 

 man came off in a small canoe. I gave him a knife and 

 a few beads, with which he seemed well pleased. Having 

 made signs to him to bring us something to eat, he im- 

 mediately left us and paddled towards the shore, but 

 meeting another man coming off, who happened to have 

 two dried salmon, he got them from him, and, on returning 

 to the ship, would give them to nobody but me. Some of 

 our people thought that he had asked for me under the 

 name of Capitane ; but in this they were probably mis- 

 taken. 



" Lieutenant Gore being now sent to the peninsula, 

 reported that there was but little fresh water, and that wood 

 was difficult to be got at, by reason of the boats grounding 

 at some distance from the beach. This being the case I 

 stood back to the other shore, and at eight o'clock the 

 next morning, sent all the boats and a party of men, with 

 an officer, to gej wood from the place where I had landed 

 two days before. 



" Next day a family of the natives came near to our 

 wooding party. I know not how many there were at first, 

 but I saw only the husband, the wife, and their child, and 

 a fourth person, who bore the human shape and that was 

 all, for he was the most deformed cripple I had ever seen 

 or heard of. The other man was almost blind ; and 

 neither he nor his wife were such good-looking people as 

 we had sometimes seen amongst the natives of this coast. 



