APPENDIX. 
511 
I was unable to account for, till towards evening, when I learned from 
Passed Midshipman Reynolds (whom I had landed on the island during 
the forenoon, unarmed, for the purpose of making some arrangements 
for trading w ith them, on the following day, for pigs, yams, &c., and 
at the same time to obtain such information in regard to said chiefs, 
as would be actually necessary to the success of my plans) that the 
news of our cruising, together with the object we had finally in view, 
had preceded us four days, with the additional embellishment that the 
ship was to follow us and destroy the island. 
This w r as voluntarily told to Mr. Reynolds by a Mr. Heath, the only 
foreign missionary upon the island, w r ho asked Mr. Reynolds if he 
would authorize him to contradict the report, and thereby quiet the 
apprehensions of the natives, who were very much alarmed, and con¬ 
tinually coming to him to learn the truth. 
This unfortunate rumour knocked all my plans in the head, and left 
me but little hopes of future success. I, however, came to the conclu¬ 
sion that if the said chief still remained upon the island, that the only 
other plausible plan for getting possession of him would be by taking 
him forcibly from his house during the night, or from the beach while 
employed trading during the day ; and to this end I had the schooner 
removed the following day to the opposite side of the island, and 
sounded out a passage in the reef leading to her from abreast Pea’s 
house. 
At a suitable time, I landed with Passed Midshipman Harrison and 
a boat’s crew near his house, and commenced trafficking, the natives 
gathering about in great numbers, and appearing less suspicious than 
upon the day previous, yet many of them with their arms. Having 
spent much of the day in this manner, without seeing any thing of said 
chief, although many others were present, I left Mr. Harrison to trade, 
while I strolled about the island. 
Having visited the most probable places for meeting with him, I at 
last went to his house, which contained nothing but women and chil¬ 
dren ; and from information subsequently obtained from a coloured 
man (who had lived eight years on the island with a chief by the 
name of Matetau), convinced me that Pea left the island soon after 
our heaving in sight; but in what direction he had gone I was unable 
to learn. This putting an end to my last hope, I returned to the 
schooner, and commenced working to the northward, to meet the ship 
at the appointed rendezvous. 
On the morning of the 1st of March launched a boat to examine 
what appeared to be a ship passage leading through the sea-reef 
around Savaii: it proved to be a boat passage only. 
