378 HONOLULU. 
somu: he was now about joining in the war against his own relatives. 
He was remarkably fine-looking, tall, and well made, and dressed out 
in the extreme of the Feejee fashion. 
Provisions were in great abundance, but not for sale, as they were 
reserving them all for the great feast to celebrate the commencement 
of the war. Aliko, their former and favourite pilot, who had been left 
at Muthuata, now returned with some canoes, bringing a refusal on 
the part of old Tui Muthuata to engage himself openly in any con- 
flict with Tanoa of Ambau, which was a great disappointment to the 
people of Somu-somu. 
Lieutenant-Commandant Ringgold having now settled all the busi- 
ness for which he had been despatched to Somu-somu, took his de- 
parture at daylight on the 18th for Turtle or Vatoa Island, in search 
of the ship Shylock, of Rochester, Massachusetts, Charles Taber, 
master. The particulars respecting the loss of this vessel are as fol- 
lows : 
On the 21st of June, 1840, at 6 p. m., Turtle Island bore southeast, 
according to their reckoning, distant thirty miles, and they were 
steering north under all sail, with a man on the look-out; at about ten 
o’clock p. m., the reef was discovered close aboard, and before they had 
time to avoid it, the ship struck. ‘Two boats were at once lowered, in 
which the master, first mate, and sixteen hands embarked, leaving the 
second mate and six men on board the vessel. 
These boats at twelve o’clock bore away for the Friendly Islands. 
After two days they reached the island of Toofona, on which they 
landed and obtained some food. The next morning they again left 
Toofona for Vavao, stopping on their way for two or three days, at 
the Hapai Islands, where they were kindly treated by the missionaries. 
On the ninth day they reached Vavao, the whole distance being about 
three hundred and fifty miles. The captain, mate, and part of the 
crew, embarked there in a missionary schooner, bound for the Feejee 
Islands, and arrived a few days after at Somu-somu, where several of 
them joined our squadron. 
As usual, while under the lee of the island, the Porpoise experienced 
light winds and hot weather. On the 25th of August they made the 
island of Ono, in latitude 21° S., longitude 179° W., and the same day 
saw Turtle Island, bearing east-by-north. At daylight on the 26th, 
Turtle Island was in sight from the deck of the Porpoise, about twelve 
miles distant. In the afternoon they were up with it, and were boarded 
by a canoe, with a white man, who said he was a seaman belonging 
to the schooner Currency Lass, which vessel, on hearing of the Shy- 
lock’s disaster, had gone there in search of any of the cargo that 
a 
