176 ARRIVAL OF MR. NOBBS AT PITCAIRN. 
at that period been four times round the world, 
and his wish was to lead a life of peace and 
usefulness to his fellow-creatures. With his 
mind steadfastly set on Pitcairn 1 s Island, he 
was detained until August, 1827, in Calcutta; 
from whence, after a very narrow escape from 
shipwreck in the Straits of Sunda, he crossed 
the Pacific in a New York ship, called the 
Ocean, to Valparaiso. There, and afterwards 
at Callao, he suffered a further detention ; but 
ultimately he succeeded in leaving Callao in 
a frail bark of eighteen tons burthen, having 
expended one hundred and fifty pounds sterling 
on the vessel and her outfit. He was accom- 
panied by only one other person, an American, 
named Noah Bunker, and arrived at Pitcairn, 
after a six weeks' voyage, in October, 1828. 
His companion died soon afterwards; and the 
vessel afforded the materials for a house for Mr. 
Nobbs. John Adams received him with kind- 
ness ; and after Adams's death, in March, 1829, 
Mr. Nobbs, who had been engaged in keeping 
school from the period of his arrival, was ap- 
pointed the teacher of the community. 
When he first entered upon his charge, the 
number of inhabitants of Pitcairn was only sixty- 
eight. From that time until the present, he 
has been with them through evil report and 
good report, as their pastor, surgeon, and school- 
master, with the exception of a few months 
during which he was absent from the island, in 
consequence of the intrusion of a Mr. Joshua Hill, 
who arrived from Otaheite in 1832. This pom- 
pous person, who was then about sixty years of 
