PACIFIC AND BEERING’S STRAIT. 
235 
We took on board as many yams as the natives could collect before CHAP, 
sun-set, and then shaped our course for Kamschatka. In doing this I 
deviated from the tracks of both Cook and Clarke, which I think was June, 
the occasion of our passage being shorter than either of theirs. Instead ' 
of running to the westward in a low latitude, we passed to the eastward 
of Bird Island, and gained the latitude of 27° N. In this parallel we 
found the trade much fresher, though more variable, and more subject 
to interruption, than within the tropic ; we had also the advantage of a 
more temperate climate, of which we stood in need, as the sickness among 
the ship’s company was so far from being removed, that on the I3th 
We had the misfortune to lose one of the marines. On this day we spoke 
the Tuscan, an English whale-ship, and found that on quitting the Sand- 
wich Islands her crew had suffered in the same way as our own, but had 
since quite recovered. In all probability the sudden change of diet from 
the usual sea-fare to so much vegetable food, added to the heat and 
humidity of the atmosphere at the season in which our visits were made 
to those islands, was the cause of the sickness of both vessels. The 
master of the Tuscan informed me that the preceding year his ship’s 
company had been so severely afflicted with sickness and scurvy that 
he found it necessary to put into Loo Choo, where he was well re- 
ceived, and his people treated with the greatest kindness, and was sup- 
plied with fresh meat and vegetables daily, without being allowed to 
make any payment, and that the only thing the natives would accept. 
Was a chart of the world. It was, however, not without the usual 
observance of narrow-minded Chinese policy, that himself and his in- 
valid crew were allowed to set their feet on shore, and even then they 
Were always attended by a party of the natives, and had a piece of ground 
bordering on the beach fenced off for them. The salute which the 
Alceste and Lyra had fired on the '25th of October was well remembered 
by these people, and they had an idea that it was an annual ceremony 
performed in commemoration of something connected with the king of 
England. On the return of this day, during the Tuscan’s visit, they 
concluded that the ship would observe the same ceremony, and looked 
forward with such anxiety and delight to the event, that the master of 
the whaler was obliged to rub up his four patereros, and go through 
II H 2 
