ANNIVERSABT ADDRESS. 29 



killed the men in her, seized the vessel and murdered the master 

 and rest of the crev/, the latter being Kanakas. This looks 

 certainly like another version of the statement made by the 

 native man at Tapoua just related, especially as the same memo- 

 randum mentions that H.M.S. "Sandfly" had been attacked, 

 and a smart engagement had taken place, by which the natives 

 had suffered loss. 



Two things seem to point out that, if these accounts relate to 

 the same vessel, she bore two names ; for in the " Sandfly's" 

 report the vessel that the Yanikoro man belonged to was the 

 "Tortue," which sailed under Erench colours, and the "Lapwing" 

 is stated to have been reported from l^J'oumea, in New Caledonia, 

 to Messrs. Montefiore, of Sydney. Whatever happened, it is 

 quite certain that the Santa Cruz people had committed an 

 aggression on an English ship of war, and had been punished 

 severely between the visit of the " Basilisk " in August, 1872, 

 and that of the " Pearl " in August, 1875. 



The death of Commodore Goodenough was probably a revenge 

 on the " Sandfly" ; the attack on the latter, and the death of 

 the Bishop, perhaps the result of feelings excited by the labour 

 traffic ; but the reception of Captain Morseby was friendly^ 

 whilst the fact is that " kill-kill " vessels, as certain labour 

 crafts are called by the natives, were objects of aversion, and 

 that if we are to trust an eye-witness (see Brooke's Journal, 

 " Mission Life, 1872, p. 7 "), very properly so. Mr. Brooke 

 says, " natives in the island of Florida were captured merely for 

 the sake of their skulls, with which payment was made to the 

 chiefs of neighbouring islands ; and canoes on coming alongside 

 a vessel were upset, and their occupants dispatched whilst vainly 

 striving to escape to shore. The victims were first belaboured 

 with oars, then fallen upon with tomahawks and finally beheaded, 

 their heads being taken on board, and their bodies thrown to 

 the sharks." 



Mr. Brooke, whose words are thus quoted, says that in the 

 course of two or three months in that one island alone he liad 



