PACIFIC AND BEERING’S STRAIT. 
33 
admit them. But to have acceded to their entreaties would have CHAP, 
encumbered the party, and subjected them to depredations. As it 
was, the boats were so weighed down by persons clinging to them, 
that for personal safety the crew were compelled to have recourse 
to sticks to keep them off, at which none of the natives took offence, 
but regained their position the instant the attention of the persons in 
the boat was called to some other object. Just within the gunwale 
there were many small things which were highly prized by the swim- 
mers; and the boats being brought low in the water by the crowd 
hanging to them, many of these articles were stolen, notwithstanding 
the most vigilant attention on the part of the crew, who had no means 
of recovering them, the marauders darting into the water, and diving 
t le moment t ey committed a theft. The women were no less active 
in these piracies than the men ; for if they were not the actual plun- 
derers, they procured the opportunity for others, by engrossing the 
attention of the seamen, by their caresses and ludicrous gestures. 
In proceeding to the landing-place the boats had to pass a small 
isolated rock which rose several feet above the water. As many 
females as could possibly find room crowded upon this eminence, 
pressing together so closely, that the rock appeared to be a mass of 
living beings. Of these Nereids three or four would shoot off at a 
time into the water, and swim with the expertness offish to the boats 
, • .i^\^ influence on their visiters. One of them, a very young 
& > ‘in ess accustomed to the water than her companions, was taken 
1 t le shoulders of an elderly man, conjectured to be her father, 
’ A ^im, recommended to the attention of one of the officers, 
w 10, in compassion, allowed her a seat in his boat. She was young and 
excee in^ y pietty , her features were small and well made, her eyes 
dark, an ler hair black, long, and flowing ; her colour, deep brunette 
She was tattooed in arches upon the forehead, and, like the greater 
part of her countrywomen, from the waist downward to the knee in 
narrow compact blue lines, which at a short distance had the appearance 
of breeches. Her only covering was a small triangular maro, made of 
grass and rushes; but this diminutive screen not agreeing’ with her 
Ideas of propriety in the novel situation in which she found herself, she 
