1835. 



CONDUCT CANOES. 



561 



evening before his death, that the Indians (meaning the natives 

 of the Navigator Islands) were worthier people than ourselves ! 



" Observing rigidly the orders I have received, I have 

 always treated them with the greatest mildness ; but I confess 

 to you, that if I were to undertake another voyage of the same 

 kind, I would demand different orders. 



" A navigator, on quitting Europe, ought to consider the 

 savages as enemies, very weak indeed, and whom it would be 

 ungenerous to attack and barbarous to destroy, but whose 

 assaults he has a right to prevent when authorised to do so by 

 well-grounded suspicions/"* — Voyage of La Perouse, vol. iii. 

 p. 413. 



When a vessel approaches the Feejee Islands, numberless 

 canoes put off, and soon surround her so closely, that unless 

 the wind is pretty fresh, she is placed in no slight jeopardy. 

 At such a time the principal chief ought to be invited on board ; 

 and presents should be given to him, while he is made to un- 

 derstand that it is necessary he should order the canoes to keep 

 off. His commands will be implicitly obeyed ; and while he is 

 on board, and well treated, there will be less risk ; but he must 

 not be relied on implicitly. 



Some of the canoes are very long, from sixty to eighty feet in 

 length : and when two such are fastened together, with a light 

 structure erected upon them, the men who stand on their 

 raised deck are above the level of a small vessePs bulwark.* 



* Heaps of stones form not only ballast but ammunition for these for- 

 midable canoes. Indeed, among" all savage nations, a stone held in the 

 hand, or thrown, perhaps from a sling-, is a common, and by no means des- 

 picable weapon. These easily collected missiles, and the manner of using- 

 them, recal to mind the victory gained by the English fleet over that of 

 France, off Sluys, on the 22d of June 1340 ; in which " though the battle 

 was fought on the sea, it could scarcely be called maritime ; for little 

 depended on the accidents of winds and waves, or on the skill of a com- 

 mander in availing himself of them. Piles of stones on the deck formed a 

 part of the magazines. The archers of both nations used their cross- 

 bows as if they had been on land. They employed grappling irons for 

 boarding, and came to such close quarters as to exhibit a succession of 

 single combats." — Mackintosh, vol. i. p. 294. 



VOL. II. 2 O 



