ULAKUA. 249 



we had the intention of making a short stay. We fonnd 

 onrselves in more than 100 fathoms with a rocky bottom. 

 In the afternoon, the Commodore sent the master in the 

 life-boat to sound the bay and find an anchorage ; he re- 

 turned before nightfall, reporting he had found twenty-eight 

 fathoms close to land. The Commodore determined to 

 stand off and on the west coast until morning. 



On August 28, without letting go anchor, the long boat 

 was lowered, into wliicli many of the officers got, with the 

 intention of landing, taking the ' Southern Cross ' in their 

 way, which was at some distance from the ' Cura^oa.' The 

 schooner was surrounded by numbers of canoes, so many 

 indeed that I could count ninety with my own eyes. They 

 were entirely different from anything I had before seen ; 

 their two ends were alike, they were without outriggers, and 

 generally carried two, rarely three men ; their paddles were 

 short, narrow, with a pointed blade. At each extremity 

 the canoes were ornamented with tassels, made of strips of 

 pandanus leaf dyed red at intervals, and also with mother- 

 of-pearl let in in different patterns. Their crews made a 

 great clatter in conducting their barter ; thick iron hoop for 

 tomahawks, together with hatchets and fishhooks, seemed 

 the great desiderata ; they would scarcely look at my beads, 

 knives, &c. They were, if possible, more loaded with 

 ornaments and knick-knacks than the natives of Santa 

 Cruz. They have bead-bracelets and armlets, some much 

 wider at the top than bottom, like a gauntlet, and of a 

 great variety of patterns. Armlets of thick solid white shell 



