320 SOME ACCOUNT OF NEW HOLLAND = cu. x11 
That they are a very pusillanimous people we had reason 
to suppose from their conduct in every place where we 
were, except at Sting-ray’s Bay, and then only two people 
opposed the landing of our two boats full of men for nearly 
a quarter of an hour, and were not to be driven away until 
several times wounded with small shot, which we were 
obliged to do, as at that time we suspected their lances to 
be poisoned, from the quantity of gum which was about 
their points. But upon every other occasion, both there 
and everywhere else, they behaved alike, shunning us, and 
giving up any part of the country we landed upon at once. 
That they use stratagems in war we learnt by the instance 
in Sting-ray’s Bay, where our surgeon with another man 
was walking in the woods and met six Indians: they stood 
still, but directed another who was up a tree how and when 
he should throw a lance at them, which he did, and on its 
not taking effect they all ran away as fast as possible. 
Their canoes were the only things in which we saw a 
manifest difference between the southern and northern 
people. Those to the southward were little better contrived 
or executed than their houses; a piece of bark tied together 
in plaits at the ends, and kept extended in the middle by 
small bows of wood, was the whole embarkation which carried 
one or two people, nay, we once saw three, who moved it 
along in shallow water with long poles, and in deeper with 
paddles about eighteen inches long, one of which they held 
in each hand. In the middle of these canoes was generally 
a small fire upon a heap of seaweed, for what purpose 
intended we did not know, except perhaps to give the 
fisherman an opportunity of eating fish in perfection, by 
broiling it the moment it is taken. To the northward their 
canoes, though exceedingly bad, were far superior to these; 
they were small, but regularly hollowed out of the trunk 
of a tree, and fitted with an outrigger to prevent them 
from upsetting. In these they had paddles large enough 
to require both hands to work them. Of this sort we saw 
few, and had an opportunity of examining only one of them, 
which might be about ten or eleven feet long, but was 
