ANNIVEESABY ADDRESS. 21 



they were thus attacked, they fired among the Indians to favour 

 their getting into their boat, and did great execution, killing 

 many and wounding more. That they were not however dis- 

 couraged, but continued to press forward, still discharging their 

 arrows by platoons in almost one continued flight ; that the 

 grappling being foul occasioned a delay in hauling off the boat, 

 during which time he and half of the boat's crew were desper- 

 ately wounded; that at last they cut the rope, and ran under 

 their foresail, still keeping up their fire with blunderbusses, each 

 loaded with 8 or 10 pistol balls, which the Indians returned with 

 their arrows, those on shore wading after them breast-high into 

 the sea. When they had got clear of these the canoes pursued 

 them with great fortitude and vigour till one of them was sunk 

 and the numbers on board the rest greatly reduced by the fire, 

 and then they returned to the shore. Such was the story of the 

 master, who, with three of my best seamen, died some time 

 afterwards of the wounds they had received ; but, culpable as he 

 appears to have been by his own account, he appears to have 

 been still more so by the testimony of those who survived him. 

 They said that the Indians behaved with the greatest confidence 

 and friendship till he gave them just cause of off'ence by ordering 

 the people that were with him, who had been regaled in one of 

 their houses, to cut doNvn a cocoa-nut tree, and insisting upon 

 the execution of his order notwithstanding the displeasure which 

 the Indians strongly expressed upon the occasion ; as soon as the 

 tree fell all of them except one, who seemed to be a person of 

 authority, went away, and in a short time a great number of 

 them were observed to draw together in a body among the trees 

 by a midshipman who was one of the party that were on shore, 

 and who immediately acquainted the master with what he had 

 seen, and told him that from the behaviour of the people he 

 imagined an attack was intended ; that the master made light of 

 the intelligence, and, instead of repairing immediately to the 

 boat, as he was urged to do, fired one of his pistols at a mark ; 

 that the Indian, who had till that time continued with them, 

 then left them abruptly and joined the body in the wood ; that 



