356 PORT ESSINOTON. 



was nouf^ht but the hideous grin of death. I ex- 

 ceedingly regret that the mother who could feel 

 so iinely was some time afterwards over-persuaded to 

 part with the bones of her child. 



I may here mention that the medical officer of the 

 settlement was in the habit of extracting teeth for the 

 natives, who found the European method much more 

 easy than their own mode of knocking them out. 

 The supercargo of a vessel, learning this fact, was 

 anxious to become a purchaser of teeth to some ex- 

 tent for the London market, being persuaded that 

 they would find a ready sale among the dentists ; 

 and it is more than probable that many of our fair 

 ladies at home are indebted for the pearls on which 

 the poets exhaust so much of their fancy to the rude 

 natives of Australia. 



Among the information I gained during this stay 

 at Port Essington respecting the Macassar people, 

 who periodically visit the coast, was that of their 

 discovering a strait leading into the Gulf of Carpen- 

 taria, behind English Company's Islands. Passing 

 Cape Wilberforce, called UdjungTuru, or Bearaway 

 Point, they continue their course down the Gulf to 

 the Wellesley Islands, named by them Pulo Tiga, or 

 The Three Islands ; this is the usual southern limit 

 of their voyage. The Macassar proas that visit 

 Port Essington, amounting in one season to fourteen, 

 usually brought for barter tea, sugar, cloths, salt- 

 fish, rice, &c. Several of the nakodhas, or masters, 

 have expressed a wish to abandon fishing, and oc- 



