SOCIETY ISLANDS DISCOVERED. 



469 



they had married two young girls of the island, with whom they 

 had been in the habit of having stolen interviews, and to whom 

 they were very much attached. They were recovered with much 

 difficulty, and compelled, by the stern laws of the naval service, 

 to leave their wives behind them. The vessel sailed on the 13th, 

 an Indian named Tupia having been gratified in his desire to 

 accompany Cook upon his voyage. As the anchor was weighed, 

 he ascended to the mast-head, weeping, and waving a handker- 

 chief to his friends in the canoe. The latter vied with each other 

 in the violence of their lamentations, which was considered by 

 the English as more affected than genuine. 



Lieutenant Cook now discovered, successively, the various 

 islands which he regarded as forming an archipelago, and to which 

 he gave the name of Society Islands. He left the last of them on 

 the 15th of August, and on the 25th celebrated the anniversary 

 of their leaving England by taking a Cheshire cheese from a 

 locker and tapping a cask of porter. On the 30th, they saw the 

 comet of that year, Tupia remarking with some agitation that 

 it would foment dissensions between the inhabitants of the two 

 islands of Bolabola and Ulieta, who would seem, from this, to 

 have been peculiarly susceptible to meteorological influences. , j 

 On the 7th of October, they discovered land, and anchored in an 

 inlet to which they gave the name of Poverty Bay. This was 

 the northeast coast of New Zealand, — an island discovered in 

 1642 by Tasman, and which had not been seen since, a space 

 of one hundred and twenty-seven years. The natives received 

 them with distrust, and several of them were somewhat unneces- 

 sarily killed by musket-shots. All efforts to enter into amicable 

 relations with them failed, and Cook determined to make another 

 attempt at some other point of the coast. Here a bloody fight 

 took place, which resulted in the capture of three young savages 

 by Cook's men. They expected to be put to death, and, when 

 relieved from their apprehension by the kindness with which they 

 were treated, were suddenly seized with a voracious appetite, and 



