10 



porter's journal. 



books to be divided among them. They all agreed to the 

 exchange, but on delivering the fish-hooks, one of them 

 swam off with his bread-fruit, refused to dehver it up, and 

 appeared much pleased with the trick he had played me, 

 believing no doubt that it would be attended with less diffi- 

 culty to divide the hooks between two than three. The 

 other two seemed to affect anger with their companion, and 

 made signs for me to pursue and beat him ; but as one of 

 them had a stick in his hand, I directed him to inflict punish- 

 ment ; this he pretended to do, but it was mere pretence. 

 But notwithstanding this friendly intercourse, it was very 

 evident that they had strong suspicions of us. They 

 always approached the boat with the greatest awe and agi- 

 tation, and in every instance, where articles were presented 

 to them, they shrunk back with terror, and retreated to 

 the shore with the utmost precipitation. This want of con- 

 fidence in me, was greatly calculated to lessen my confidence 

 in them, and even if the surf had admitted of my landing, I 

 should not have considered it adviseable to venture ashore. 

 One of them, however, ventured to raise himself by the 

 side of the boat, and perceiving a pistol lying in the stern 

 sheets, showed an evident desire to possess it. It was with 

 some difficulty I could make him let go his hold of the 

 boat; and to intimidate him I pointed the pistol at him ; 

 but it produced no other effect than joy, as he immediately 

 held out both his hands to receive it, from which I con- 

 cluded that they were unacquainted with the use of fire- 

 arms. 



After remaining with these people about two hours, I 

 proceeded to a small cove, two miles to leeward, where 

 were assembled about fifty male natives and three females. 

 Some of the men were highly ornamented with plumes of 

 black feathers, large gorgets similar to those we had before 

 purchased, and a kind of cloak formed of white cloth, in 

 appearance somewhat like paper. Each held in his hand 

 a handsome white fan, and had large tufts of human hair 

 bound round the wrist, their ancles and loins, with large 

 white oval ornaments, apparently intended as false ears, 

 and large shells and whales' teeth hung round their necks. 

 They made altogether no inelegant appearance. They 

 were all highly tattooed, and supposing one of the best 

 dressed among them to be the chief, I gave him to under- 



