WHALING VOYAGE. 
319 
CHAPTER VIII. 
As it was our captain’s determination to go off to the 
“ Ladrone Islands ” to refresh, we still continued our 
course to the northward, so that on the 29th of January 
1832, New Ireland was again in sight, bearing n. n. w., 
and at sunrise on the morning of the 31st, we found 
ourselves under the lee of Saint John’s Island, the 
centre of which also bore from the ship about north, 
and which is situated in the longitude of 150° 50' east, 
and in the latitude of 3° 5' south* The islands which 
are marked on the charts, and named u Hardy’s and 
“ Hunter’s” Islands, cannot be in real existence : we 
passed over their sites, as they are laid down on the 
charts, and could see nothing of them. 
At ten a. m., two boats were sent on shore on the 
south side of Saint John’s Island, to endeavour to pro- 
cure some yams from its inhabitants,— and we had no 
sooner got within half a ship’s length of the shore than 
we saw one of the natives wading towards us with a 
small basket containing about ten or a dozen bulbous 
roots, somewhat resembling a potato, and which we 
afterwards found was not much inferior in taste. When 
he arrived near the boat, we gave him a piece of old 
iron hoop about four inches long for them, with which 
