APR. 1769 LAGOON ISLAND 



69 



has something in it that puts me in mind of the scurvy, I 

 took up the lemon-juice put up by Dr. Hulme's direction, 

 and found that that which was concentrated by evaporating 

 six gallons into less than two has kept as well as anything 

 could do. The small cag, in which was lemon-juice with 

 one-fifth of brandy, was also very good, though a large part 

 of it had leaked out by some fault in the cag : this, there- 

 fore, I began to make use of immediately, drinking very 

 weak punch made with it for my common liquor. 



4th. At ten this morning my servant, Peter Briscoe, 

 saw land which we had almost passed by ; we stood towards 

 it, and found it to be a small island (Lagoon Island) about 

 a mile and a half or two miles in length ; those who were 

 upon the topmast-head perceived it to be nearly circular, 

 and to have a lagoon or pool of water in the middle, which 

 occupied by far the largest part of the island. About noon 

 we were close to it, within a mile or thereabouts, and dis- 

 tinctly saw inhabitants, of whom we counted twenty-four; 

 they appeared to us through our glasses to be tall and to 

 have very large heads, or possibly much hair upon them ; 

 eleven of them walked along the beach abreast of the ship, 

 each with a pole or pike as long again as himself in his 

 hand. Every one of them was stark naked, and appeared 

 of a brown copper colour ; as soon, however, as the ship had 

 fairly passed the island they retired higher up on the beach 

 and seemed to put on some clothes, or at least cover themselves 

 with something which made them appear of a light colour. 



The island was covered with trees of many different 

 verdures : the palms or cocoanut trees we could plainly 

 distinguish, particularly two that were amazingly taller than 

 their fellows, and at a distance bore a great resemblance to 

 flags. The land seemed very low ; though at a distance 

 several parts of it had appeared high, yet when we came 

 near them they proved to be clumps of palms. Under the 

 shade of these were the houses of the natives, in spots cleared 

 of all underwood, so that pleasanter groves cannot be 

 imagined, at least so they appeared to us, whose eyes had so 

 long been unused to any other object than water and sky. 



