46 OVOLAU. 
| 
company. I had compiled a chart of the comparatively unknown sea 
we were about to traverse; but the weather was threatening, and from 
the specimen we had had in the morning of its dangers, I thought it 
would be prudent to haul off, which I did, at 2 p. m. At five, land 
was reported ahead, and on the lee bow; it proved to be the island of 
Totoia, which I now found was thirty miles out of the position assigned 
it by former navigators. I at once came to the determination of 
running into the group, feeling assured we should thus save much time, 
and probably find smoother water; the dangers we had to encounter 
in either way were about equal. It was now blowing a fresh gale, 
which obliged us to take three reefs in the topsails; it is by no means 
a pleasant business to be running over unknown ground, in a dark 
night, before a brisk gale, at the rate of seven or eight miles an hour. 
The sea was unusually phosphorescent, and the night was disagreeable 
with rain and mists. The Peacock and Flying-Fish followed us. The 
morning proved fine, and at daylight we were within a short distance 
of the Horse-shoe Reef, unknown to any of us but Tom, who thought 
we must be at least twenty miles from it. We found ourselves in the 
midst of a number of beautiful islands, viz.,* Goro, Vanua-levu, and 
Somu-somu on our right; Nairai, Ambatiki, and Matuku, on the left ; 
whilst Ovolau, Wakaia, and Mokungai, were in front; they were all 
girt by white encircling reefs. So beautiful was their aspect, that I 
could scarcely bring my mind to the realizing sense of the well-known 
fact, that they were the abode of a savage, ferocious, and treacherous 
race of cannibals. ; 
Each island had its own peculiar beauty, but the eye as well as 
mind felt more satisfaction in resting upon Ovolau, which as we 
approached, had more of the appearance of civilization about it than 
the others; it is also the highest, most broken, and most picturesque. 
In consequence of light winds, we did not succeed in reaching the 
harbour of Levuka that evening, and passed the night under way, 
between Ovolau and Wakaia. At daylight on the 8th of May, we 
were off the port, and made all sail for it. At nine o’clock, being off the 
entrance, I took the precaution, as the breeze was light, to hoist the 
boats out (having to pass through a passage only eight hundred feet in 
width), and sent them ahead to tow. At first it is not a little alarming 
to approach these entrances with a light wind, and often with a strong 
current setting in or out; the ship rolling and tossing with the swell 
as she nears the reefs, the deep-blue water of the ocean curling into 
* In the orthography of the names of the Feejee Group, I have followed the pronuncia- 
tion, and not the true construction of the language, which will be explained in a subsequent 
chapter. 
