Captain Cook: His Life, Voyages, and Discoveries

W.H.G. Kingston

"Captain Cook"

Chapter One.

Captain Cook—His Life, Voyages, and Discoveries.

Early Training.

Among all those Englishmen who, from a humble origin, have risen to an honourable position, Captain James Cook is especially worthy of record. His parents were of the peasant class—his father having commenced life as a farm-labourer, and his mother being a cottager’s daughter. Probably, however, they were both superior to others of the same station, as the husband, in process of time, became farm-bailiff to his employer—a Mr Thomas Skottowe. This was about the year 1730, and the farm of which he had the management was called Airy-Holme, near Ayton, in Yorkshire. Not far from this place, at the village of Marton, near Stockton-upon-Tees; his son James was born, on October 27, 1728. James was one of nine children, all of whom he survived, with the exception of a sister who married a fisherman at Redcar.

The father of this family spent the latter years of his life with his daughter at Redcar, and was supposed to have been about eighty-five years old at the time of his death; so that he must have had the satisfaction of seeing his son rising in his profession, though probably he little thought of that son as establishing a fame which would be handed down in history.

James Cook does not appear to have enjoyed any peculiar educational advantages, but owed his subsequent advancement chiefly to his own intelligence, perseverance, and diligence. He first went to a village school, and was afterwards sent, at the expense of Mr Skottowe, to an ordinary commercial school, kept by a Mr Pullen. He continued there four years, and was then apprenticed to Mr William Sanderson, a grocer and haberdasher at the fishing town of Straiths, ten miles from Whitby. It may be supposed that the occupation in which he was engaged was not suited to his taste. The sea was constantly before his eyes, and the desire to seek his fortune on it sprang up within him, and grew stronger and stronger, till in about a year after he went to Straiths he obtained a release from his engagement with Mr Sanderson, and apprenticed himself to Messrs Walker and Company, shipowners of Whitby. He went to sea for the first time when he was about eighteen, on board one of their vessels—the Truelove collier, (Note 1) of four hundred and fifty tons burden, trading between Newcastle and London. The lad soon showed that he was well fitted for his new profession, and in 1748, not two years after he had commenced it, we find him especially directed to assist in fitting for sea the Three Brothers, a new ship of six hundred tons. While he served on board this ship she was hired by Government as a transport; and on her being paid off she was employed in the Norway trade.

After making several voyages in the Three Brothers up the Baltic, young Cook was promoted to the rank of mate on board the Friendship. He had by this time gained the goodwill of his employers; and had made several other friends on shore, who, before long, were enabled to render him essential service. He was now known as a thorough seamen; indeed, from the moment he went on board ship, he had steadily applied his mind to acquiring a knowledge of his profession. Still he served on as mate of the Friendship till the breaking out of the war between England and France in 1756, when he made up his mind to push his fortunes in the Royal Navy. He knew that at all events there was a great probability of his being pressed into the service, and he had good reason to hope that he might be placed ere long on the quarter-deck, since many young men at that time had been who went to sea, as he had done, before the mast. He accordingly volunteered, and entered as an able seaman on board the Eagle, of sixty guns, then commanded by Captain Hamer, but shortly afterwards by Captain Palliser, who became the well-known Sir Hugh Palliser—Cook’s warm and constant friend.

As soon as the young sailor’s Yorkshire friends heard that he had entered on board a man-of-war, they exerted themselves on his behalf, and a letter of introduction was procured from Mr Osbaldeston, Member for the county, to his captain, who, having already remarked the intelligence and assiduity Cook exhibited in all his professional duties, was the more ready to give him a helping hand.

Considering how best he could assist the young man, who had served too short a time in the Navy to obtain a commission, Captain Palliser advised that a master’s warrant should be procured for him—this being a position for which, both from age and experience, he was well fitted. (Note 2.) This was done; and on May 10, 1759, James Cook was appointed to the Grampus, sloop of war, and was now in a fair way of gaining the object of his ambition. He had, however, to undergo a trial of patience at the first outset of his career; for the former master returning, his appointment was cancelled. His friends were not idle, and four days after this he was made master of the Garland; but on going to join her he found that she had already sailed for her destination. On the following day, May 15, he was appointed to the Mercury, on the point of sailing for the North American station to join the fleet under Sir Charles Saunders, which, in conjunction with the army under General Wolfe, was engaged in the siege of Quebec. The termination of that contest gained for Great Britain one of her finest provinces. To this success Cook contributed in his particular department; and it is remarkable that he should have been in various ways instrumental in giving to his country the three finest provinces she possesses—Canada, the Australian settlements, and New Zealand.

James Cook was now about thirty-two years of age, and although the position in life he had filled for the previous twelve years was not one (especially in those days) conducive to refinement of manners, he appears from the first to have conducted himself with propriety and credit. He had already shown his superiority as a seaman. He was now to exhibit his talents in the more scientific part of his profession, in which officers in the Navy were in those days greatly deficient.

It was necessary to take the soundings in the channel of the Saint Lawrence, between the Isle of Orleans and the north shore, directly in front of the French fortified camp of Montmorency and Beauport, in order to enable the admiral to place his ships so as to oppose the enemy’s batteries, and to cover the projected landing of the British army under Wolfe, and a general attack on their camp. Captain Palliser, who now commanded the Shrewsbury, a seventy-four gun ship, recommended Cook for this difficult and dangerous service. He was engaged on it for many consecutive nights, it being a work which could not be performed in the daytime. At length his proceedings were discovered by the French, who laid a plan to catch him. They concealed in a wood near the water a number of Indians with their canoes. As the Mercury’s barge, in which Cook was making the survey, passed, the canoes darted out on him and gave chase. His only chance of escape was to run for it. He pushed for the Isle of Orleans with a whole host of yelling savages paddling at full speed after him. On they came, every moment gaining on his boat. The English hospital, where there was a guard, was before him; towards this he steered, the bows of the Indian canoes almost touching the barge’s stern; a few strokes more, and the Indians would have grappled him. He sprang from his seat over the bow of his boat, followed by his crew, just as the enemy leaped in overwhelming numbers over the quarters. They carried off the barge in triumph, but Cook and his comrades escaped; and he succeeded, in spite of all difficulties, in furnishing the admiral with a correct and complete draft of the channel and soundings. This was the more extraordinary, as Sir Hugh Palliser afterwards expressed his belief that before this time Cook had scarcely ever used a pencil, and knew nothing of drawing; and it is one of many proofs that the ardent seaman not only threw his soul into the duties of his profession, but that this determination enabled him quickly to master every subject to which he applied his mind.

While his ship remained in the Saint Lawrence, Cook, at the desire of the admiral, made an accurate survey of the more difficult parts of that river below Quebec. So complete and perfect was the chart which he executed, and which, with his sailing directions, was afterwards published, that until a late period no other was thought necessary. So little were the English acquainted with the navigation of the river before this, that when, early in the season, the fleet under Rear-Admiral Darell arrived at its mouth, some difficulty was expected in getting up it. Fortunately, when off the island of Caudec, the inhabitants, mistaking the English ships for their own fleet, sent off their best pilots. These were of course detained, and proved of great use in taking the English fleet up the river.

After the conquest of Canada had been accomplished, Admiral Saunders despatched the larger ships to England, following himself in the Somerset, and leaving the command of the fleet in North America to Captain Lord Colvill, who had his commodore’s flag flying on board the Northumberland. To this ship Cook was appointed as master, by warrant from his lordship, on September 22, 1739. The squadron wintered at Halifax. Cook employed the leisure which the winter afforded him in acquiring that knowledge which especially fitted him for the service in which he was thereafter to be engaged. At Halifax he first read Euclid, and began to study astronomy and other branches of science, in which, considering the few books to which he had access, and the want of assistance from others, he made wonderful progress. In the following year, 1760, a lieutenant’s commission was presented to him as a reward for his services.

In 1762 the Northumberland was engaged in the recapture of Newfoundland. The activity which Cook displayed in surveying its harbour and heights attracted the attention of Captain Graves, the acting governor, and commander of the Antelope. Captain Graves, on becoming farther acquainted with Cook, formed a high opinion of his abilities, while he admired the energy and perseverance he exhibited in surveying the neighbouring coasts and harbours.

At the end of the year Cook went to England, and on December 21 he married, at Barking, in Essex, Miss Elizabeth Batts, a young lady of respectable family, to whom he had some time before been engaged. As she died in 1835, at the age of ninety-three, she must at the time of her marriage have been twenty years old. Her husband was tenderly attached to her, but his married life, like that of most sailors, had long and frequent interruptions. She bore him six children, three of whom died in their infancy.

Soon after Cook’s marriage, peace with France and Spain was concluded. On this Captain Graves was again appointed Governor of Newfoundland. As the island was of great importance to England, he obtained from the Government, with some difficulty, an establishment for the survey of its coasts, and offered the direction of it to Cook, who, notwithstanding his recent marriage, accepted the offer. In the following year, 1764, Sir Hugh Palliser being appointed Governor of Newfoundland and Labrador, Cook was made Marine Surveyor of the Province, the Grenville schooner being placed under his command. The charts made by Cook enlightened the Government as to the value of Newfoundland, and induced them, when drawing up articles of peace with France, to insist on arrangements which secured to Great Britain the advantages which its coasts afford. Not content, however, with merely surveying the shore, Cook penetrated into the interior of the country, and discovered several lakes hitherto unknown.

On August 5 an eclipse of the sun occurred, an observation of which was taken by Cook from one of the Burgeo Islands, near the south-west end of Newfoundland. The paper that he wrote on it was published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. This fact alone proves that he must already have become a good mathematician and astronomer. The last time he went to Newfoundland as marine surveyor was in 1767.

We have now briefly traced the career of James Cook from his childhood to the period when he had established his character as an able seaman, a scientific navigator, and a good officer. He was soon to have an opportunity of proving to his country and to the world in general the very high degree in which he possessed these qualities, and which enabled him to accomplish an undertaking which has proved of inestimable benefit to millions of the human race. By his means, discovery was made of fertile lands of vast extent, previously trodden only by the feet of wandering savages; and numberless tribes, sunk in the grossest idolatry and human degradation, were made known to the Christian world. And Christians,

roused at length to a sense of their responsibility, began to devise means, under the blessing of God, for teaching these, their ignorant brethren of the human family, the knowledge of the only true God, and the way of eternal life.

Note 1. In the biographies of Cook the name of the vessel in which he first went to sea is given as the Freelove—evidently a misprint. I have never known a vessel of that name, whereas the Truelove is a favourite name.

Note 2. Masters in the Navy were in those days appointed by warrant, and were very generally taken direct from the merchant service without going through any preparatory grade, as at present. They are now also commissioned officers, and on retiring receive commanders’ rank.

Chapter Two.

First Voyage of Discovery. August 1768 to July 1771.

In the year 1763, on the restoration of peace, the desire to explore unknown seas and to discover new countries revived among the English, and was warmly encouraged by King George the Third. Two expeditions were at once fitted out to circumnavigate the globe—one under Lord Byron, and the other under Captains Wallis and Carteret; the former commanding the Dolphin, in which Lord Byron had just returned, the latter the Swallow. As, however, Captains Wallis and Carteret accidentally parted company at an early period of their voyage, and kept different routes, they are generally considered as having led two separate expeditions.

Before the return of these ships, another expedition was determined on, the immediate object of which was to observe a transit of Venus which it had been calculated by astronomers would occur in 1769. It was believed that one of the Marquesas, or one of the Friendly Islands, called, by Tasman, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Middleburg, would be an advantageous spot for making the proposed observation.

The King was memorialised by the Royal Society, and through his Majesty’s intervention the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty undertook to furnish a suitable vessel and crew to convey the astronomers and other scientific persons who might be selected to carry out the proposed objects. The Royal Society had fixed on Mr Alexander Dalrymple to take the direction of the expedition; but as he was not in the Royal Navy, Sir Edward Hawke, then at the head of the Admiralty, would not hear of his being appointed. Mr Dalrymple, on the other hand, would not consent to go unless he received a brevet commission as captain. It was necessary, therefore, to find some one else, and Mr Stephens, the Secretary of the Admiralty, a warm supporter of the expedition, mentioned Cook to the Board, and suggested that Sir Hugh Palliser’s opinion should be asked respecting him. This, as may be supposed, was in every respect favourable; and consequently Lieutenant Cook was directed to hold himself in readiness to take command of the proposed expedition. Sir Hugh Palliser was requested to select a fit ship for the purpose, and with Cook’s assistance he fixed on a barque of three hundred and seventy tons, to which the name of the Endeavour was given. She mounted ten carriage and ten swivel guns; her crew, besides the commander, consisted of eighty-four persons, and she was provisioned for eighteen months.

The well-known Sir Joseph Banks, then Mr Banks, one of the chief promoters of the expedition, volunteered to accompany it. On leaving Oxford he had visited the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador, to obtain information on scientific subjects. Although he suffered no small amount of hardship on that occasion, he returned home with unabated zeal in the cause he had adopted, and ready again to leave all the advantages which his position afforded him, for the discomfort and dangers of a long voyage in unknown seas. Mr Banks was, however, more than a philosopher—he was a large-hearted philanthropist, and he was animated with the hope of diffusing some of the advantages of civilisation and Christianity among the people who might be discovered. He engaged, as naturalist to the expedition, the services of Dr Solander, a Swede by birth, educated under Linnaeus, from whom he had brought letters of introduction to England. Mr Banks also, at his own charge, took out a secretary and two artists—one to make drawings from subjects of natural history, the other to take sketches of scenery and the portraits of the natives who might be met with. He had likewise four personal attendants, two of whom were negroes.

The Government, on its part, appointed Mr Charles Green, who had long been assistant to Dr Bradley at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, to assist Lieutenant Cook in the astronomical department of the expedition; and in every respect the persons engaged in this celebrated expedition were well fitted to attain the objects contemplated.

While these preparations were going forward, Captain Wallis returned from his voyage round the world. He expressed his opinion that a harbour in an island he had discovered, and called King George’s Island, since well-known as Otaheite or Tahiti, was a fit spot for observing the transit of Venus. That island was accordingly to be the first destination of the Endeavour. After having accomplished the primary object of the voyage, the commander was directed to proceed in making discoveries through the wide extent of the Great Southern Ocean.

Lieutenant Cook received his commission as commander of the Endeavour (which was then in the basin in Deptford Yard) on May 25, 1768. On the 27th he went on board, and immediately began fitting her for

sea. The work in dockyards was not executed so rapidly in those days as it is now, and it was upwards of two months before the vessel was ready. On July 30 she dropped down the river; but it was not till August 15 that she reached Plymouth. On Friday, August 26, the wind becoming fair, the Endeavour finally put to sea, and commenced the first of one of the most memorable series of voyages which have ever been performed by a single vessel. Next to Commander Cook in authority in the Endeavour were her two lieutenants—Zachary Hicks and John Gore; her senior mate was Charles Clerke, who accompanied Cook in each of his subsequent voyages, and succeeded to the command of the third expedition on the death of his beloved captain. He had previously served as midshipman under Lord Byron in his first voyage round the world.

A long sea voyage is almost always felt to be extremely tedious and dull to landsmen; but every change in the atmosphere, the varied appearance presented by the sea, the numberless creatures found in it, the birds which hovered about the ship or pitched on the rigging, all afforded matter of interest to the enlightened persons on board the Endeavour.

At Madeira the naturalists of the expedition set to work collecting specimens. The social condition of the people has probably altered little since those days, though the monasteries, which then existed, have long since been abolished. The nuns of the convent of Santa Clara especially amused Mr Banks and his companions by the simplicity of the questions they put on hearing that they were philosophers. Among others, they requested them to ascertain by their art whether a spring of pure water existed within the walls of their convent, and also when the next thunderstorm would occur.

On leaving Madeira the course was shaped for Rio de Janeiro, which was reached on November 13. The voyagers were not treated by the viceroy with the courtesy which might have been expected. The object of the voyage was utterly beyond the comprehension of that functionary, who could form no other conception of the matter than that it had something to do with the passing of the North Star through the South Pole. This ignorance and suspicion caused the voyagers a great deal of annoyance during the whole of their stay; though the viceroy could not refuse them water and other necessaries. When, at length, these were procured, and the Endeavour was going out of the harbour, she was fired at from the forts of Santa Cruz. Cook immediately sent on shore to demand the cause of this act. The excuse offered by the commandant of the port was that he had received no orders from the viceroy to allow the ship to pass. It appeared that the letter had been written, but that through neglect it had not been forwarded. Through the whole of the contest with the viceroy, Cook behaved with equal spirit and discretion. Among the remarks which Cook makes in his journal on Brazil, is one on the fearful expense of life at which the royal gold mines in that country were worked. No less than forty thousand negroes were annually imported to labour in the royal mines. In the year 1766, through an epidemic, the number required falling short, twenty thousand more were drafted from the town of Rio. A very similar account may be given of the silver and other mines on the other side of the continent; while the treacherous system which was organised to supply the demand for labour from among the inhabitants of the Pacific Islands must be looked on with even greater horror and indignation than that which existed for supplying Brazil with slave labour. So strictly were the Brazilian gold mines guarded, that no stranger was allowed to visit them, and any person found on the roads leading to them was immediately hanged by the guards stationed there. Altogether Cook formed a very unfavourable opinion of the inhabitants of Brazil, though few parts of the tropics surpass it in beauty of climate, fertility of soil, and power of production.

After a stay of three weeks in the harbour of Rio, the Endeavour put to sea on December 7, and stood down the coast of South America. On approaching the latitudes of the Falkland Islands, the crew, complaining of cold, received what was called a Magellanic jacket, and a pair of trousers made of a thick woollen stuff called Fearnought. Instead of going through the Straits of Magellan, as was the custom in those times, the Endeavour was steered from the Strait of Le Maire between Helen Island and Tierra del Fuego. On her anchoring in the Bay of Good Success, several of the party went on shore. Thirty or forty Indians soon made their appearance, but, distrustful of the strangers, quickly retreated to a distance. On this, Mr Banks and Dr Solander advanced, when two of the Indians approached them and sat down. As the Englishmen drew near, the savages rose and each threw away from him a stick which he had in his hand, returning immediately to their companions and making signs to the white men to follow. This they did, and friendly relations were at once established between the two parties. Three of them were induced to go on board, and were chiefly remarkable for the entire want of interest with which they regarded all the novelties by which they were surrounded. One of them, who was conjectured to be a priest, did little else than shout all the time he was on board. He was supposed, by this, to be engaged in the performance of some heathenish incantation. When these three men were landed, their fellow-savages showed great eagerness to learn what they had seen in the strange big canoe, as they would probably have termed the English ship.

On December 16, Mr Banks and Dr Solander, with Mr Green, Mr Monkhouse the surgeon, and several attendants, landed, with the intention of ascending a mountain seen in the distance, and penetrating as far as they could into the country. The atmosphere when they set out was like that of a warm spring day in England. It being the middle of summer, the day was one of the longest in the year. Nothing could have been more favourable for their expedition. They had gone through a wood, and were about to pass over what at a distance they had taken to be a plain, but which proved to be a swamp covered thickly with tangled bushes three feet high. Still they pushed across it, and reached the mountain, on which Mr Banks and Dr Solander commenced collecting specimens. Most of the party were greatly fatigued, and Mr Buchan, the draughtsman, was seized with a fit. He was therefore left with some of the party while the rest went forward. The weather, however, changed—the cold became intense, and snow fell very thickly. Dr Solander had warned his companions not to give way to the sensation of sleepiness which intense cold produces, yet he was one of the first to propose to lie down and rest. Mr Banks, however, not without the greatest difficulty, urged him on, but the two black servants lay down and were frozen to death, and a seaman who remained with them nearly shared

the same fate. The survivors collected together at night, but their provisions were exhausted; one or two were very ill, and they were a long day’s journey from the ship. There appeared, indeed, a great probability that the chief objects of the voyage would be frustrated by the death of the principal scientific persons engaged in it. After a night of great anxiety, a vulture they had shot being their only food, the snow partially cleared off, and they made their way to the beach, which was not so far distant as they had supposed.

After this disastrous adventure the party again went on shore, and found a tribe of savages, numbering fifty persons, living in a collection of conical huts, rudely formed of boughs, and open on the lee side. The people, who are stout and clumsily formed, had their faces painted, and were very imperfectly covered with seal-skins. Their chief article of clothing, indeed, was a small cloak which they wore on the side on which the wind comes when walking or sitting. They lived chiefly on shell-fish, and in search of them wandered from place to place. They were considered as among the most dull and stupid of the human race. No wonder, indeed, considering the few objects on which their minds could be expanded. A farther acquaintance with these tribes has shown that they have minds as capable of receiving good impressions as other human beings, and that they are not destitute of a considerable amount of intelligence.

The Endeavour took her departure from Cape Horn on January 26, 1769. She ran for seven hundred leagues without land being seen. After that she passed several coral islands, the appearance of which is now familiar to most people, but in those days was but little-known. To three of them the names of Lagoon Island, Bow Island, and Chain Island were given; several of them were inhabited.

On April 11 she sighted Otaheite, (now known as Tahiti) called King George’s Island by Captain Wallis, which appeared high and mountainous, and on the 13th came to an anchor in Matavai Bay. As she approached the land numerous canoes came off, their crews carrying young plantains and other green branches as a sign of friendship. Several of the boughs were handed on board, and it was intimated that they should be placed in different parts of the ship to show that the voyagers also wished for peace. The natives exhibited great satisfaction on this being done. They gladly exchanged cocoanuts, fruit resembling apples, bread-fruit, and small fish, for beads and other trifles. They had a pig, which they would not part with for anything but a hatchet; this Cook would not allow to be given, considering that if a hatchet was given them it would be considered from that time forward to be the proper price of a pig.

The bread-fruit, with which the voyagers now first became acquainted, grows on a tree about the height of an ordinary oak. Its leaves are about a foot and a half long, of an oblong shape, deeply sinuated like those of the fig-tree, which they resemble in consistency and colour; they also, on being broken, exude a white, milky juice. The fruit is about the size and shape of a child’s head, and the surface is reticulated. It is covered with a thin skin, and has an oblong core four inches long. The eatable part, which lies between the skin and the core, is as white as snow, and of the consistency of new bread. It must be roasted before it is eaten, being first divided into three or four parts. Its taste is insipid, with a slight sweetness somewhat resembling the crumb of wheaten bread mixed with a Jerusalem artichoke.

The first person who came off was Owhaw. He was well-known to Mr Gore, and to others who had been there with Captain Wallis. It was hoped that he would prove useful, and he was therefore taken on board and every attention shown him. Captain Cook at once issued a set of rules to govern the ship’s company in all their intercourse with the natives. They were as follows:—

“1. To endeavour by every fair means to cultivate a friendship with the natives; and to treat them with all imaginable humanity.

“2. A proper person or persons will be appointed to trade with the natives for all manner of provisions, fruit, and other productions of the earth; and no officer or seaman, or other person belonging to the ship, excepting such as are so appointed, shall trade or offer to trade for any sort of provision, fruit, or other productions of the earth, unless they have leave so to do.

“3. Every person employed on shore, on any duty whatsoever, is strictly to attend to the same; and if by any neglect he loses any of his arms or working tools, or suffers them to be stolen, the full value thereof will be charged against his pay, according to the custom of the Navy in such cases; and he shall receive such further punishment as the nature of the case may deserve.

“4. The same penalty will be inflicted on every person who is found to embezzle, trade, or offer to trade with any part of the ship’s stores of what nature soever.

“5. No sort of iron, or anything that is made of iron, or any sort of cloth, or other useful or necessary articles are to be given in exchange for anything but provisions.”

Though there can be no doubt as to Captain Cook’s own feelings and wishes, his subordinates did not always act in accordance with them; and his judicious and benevolent designs with regard to the natives were thus frequently frustrated. As soon as the ship was secured, he, with Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and a party of men under arms, went on shore, where they were received by hundreds of the natives, whose countenances exhibited their friendly feelings. At first, however, the simple people were so struck with awe that they approached their visitors crouching down almost on their hands and feet, while they carried in their hands the green boughs as emblems of peace. The leader presented Captain Cook with a bough, which he and his companions received with looks and gestures of kindness and satisfaction. Each of the Englishmen also immediately gathered a bough, and carried it in the same way the natives did theirs. The party then proceeded about a mile and a half towards the place where Captain Wallis’ ship, the Dolphin, had watered. Here a halt was called, and the natives having cleared away all the plants that grew on the ground, the principal persons among them threw their green branches on the bare spot, and made signs that their visitors should do the same. Captain Cook at once yielded to this request. The marines being drawn up, each as he passed dropped his bough on those of the Indians, the officers then doing the same. The natives now intimated to Captain Cook that he might make use of the ground for any purpose he desired; but as it was not suitable for the purpose of the expedition, the offer was declined.

The party now took a circuitous route of four or five miles through groves of trees which were loaded with cocoanuts and bread-fruit, and afforded the most grateful shade. Under these trees were the habitations of the people, most of them in the daytime presenting the appearance of a roof without walls. Mats at night were let down to afford such privacy and shelter as the habits of the people and the genial climate required. The whole scene seemed to realise to the voyagers the poetical fables of Arcadia.

The reception Captain Wallis met with from these people was in the first instance very different from that which Captain Cook and his companions now received. No sooner did the Dolphin, which the savages called a huge canoe without an outrigger, appear, than several thousand people, in canoes laden with stones, came off and attacked her. Not until they had been repeatedly fired on, and many of their number had been killed, did they retire. Several shots were fired at the crowds on shore before they would disperse. The people then saw that it would be hopeless to contend with the strangers, and with green boughs in their hands sued for peace. After this, Captain Wallis was treated with great attention, especially by a female chief, whom he called a queen or princess, and who lived in a house much larger than any others in the neighbourhood. On Captain Cook’s arrival, no trace of her house was to be found, and the princess herself had disappeared. Indeed, the voyagers were convinced that as yet they had seen none of the leading chiefs of the island. The next day, however, two persons of greater consequence than any who had yet appeared came off, called Matahah and Tootahah; the first fixing on Mr Banks as his friend, and the latter on Captain Cook. The ceremony consisted in the natives taking off a great part of their clothing, and putting on that of their white friends. A similar ceremony exists among some of the tribes of North America. The dress of the natives was formed from cloth made of the bark of the paper-mulberry tree.

Captain Cook, Mr Banks, and others accompanied these chiefs on shore, where they met another chief, Tubourai Tamaide, and formed a treaty of friendship with him. He invited them to his house, and gave them a feast of fish, bread-fruit, cocoanuts, and plantains, dressed after the native fashion. The natives ate some of the fish raw, a feat the Englishmen could not accomplish. The general harmony was interrupted by Dr Solander and Mr Monkhouse finding that their pockets had been picked, the one of an opera glass, the other of his snuff-box. Mr Banks on this started up and struck the butt end of his musket violently on the ground. On this, most of the people ran away, but the chief remained. To show his concern, and that he had nothing to do with the theft, he offered Mr Banks several pieces of native cloth as a compensation. When Mr Banks refused it, and let him understand that he required only what had been taken away, the chief went out, and in half an hour returned with the snuff-box and the case of the opera glass. His countenance fell when he found the case empty, and taking Mr Banks by the hand, he led him out towards the shore at a rapid rate. On the way, followed by Dr Solander and Mr Monkhouse, he passed a woman, who handed him a piece of cloth, which he took, and went on till he reached another house, where a woman received them. He intimated that they should give her some beads. These with the cloth were placed on the floor, when the woman went out, and in half an hour returned with the glass. The beads were now returned, and the cloth was forced on Dr Solander, who could not well refuse it, though he insisted on giving a present in return. This, among other instances, shows

that the people had a sense of justice, and were raised above the savage state in which the inhabitants of many of the surrounding islands were plunged.

A spot was at last fixed on, away from habitations, where the astronomical instruments could be set up, protected by a fort; and on the 10th, Captain Cook, accompanied by Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and Mr Green, went on shore with a party of men to commence operations. A number of natives, on seeing them, collected to watch their proceedings; though they had no weapons, it was intimated to them that they must not cross a line which the captain drew in front of the ground it was proposed to occupy. Having taken all the precautions he considered necessary, he left a midshipman and a party of marines to guard the tent, and, with Mr Banks and the other gentlemen, set off on an excursion through the woods, accompanied by Owhaw, who, however, seemed very unwilling that they should go far from the shore. One of their objects was to obtain poultry and pigs. Owhaw’s unwillingness to proceed arose, they believed, from the fact that their live-stock had been driven into the interior by the natives lest their white visitors should lay violent hands on them.

As fresh meat or poultry was much wanted, Mr Banks, seeing some ducks, fired and killed three at one shot, which so astonished the natives that most of them fell flat on the ground as if knocked down by the same discharge. They soon recovered, however, and proceeded with the white men. The Englishmen were walking somewhat apart, when, shortly after the above-mentioned incident, two shots were heard. Owhaw, on this, seemed to think, as the visitors did, that something was wrong, and signing to them to keep together, sent most of the natives away. Three chiefs, however, remained, who instantly broke off green boughs from the nearest trees, and extended them towards the English, to show that they wished to be on terms of friendship, whatever had happened. The Englishmen, of course, full of anxiety, hurried back to the tent. On their arrival they found that the natives had fled, and that one of them had been killed. It appeared that a native had suddenly seized the sentry’s musket and made off with it, when the midshipman, most improperly, ordered the marines to fire. This they did, into the very middle of the flying crowd; but finding that the thief did not fall, they pursued and shot him dead. It is easy to fancy Captain Cook’s grief and annoyance at this incident. In spite of his humane desire to treat the natives justly and kindly, and to cultivate their goodwill, and notwithstanding all his precautions against violence, blood had been shed. Though the native had acted wrongly, death was too severe a punishment for his fault. The chiefs who had remained with Cook behaved very well. Calling the people around, they enabled him to explain to them that though the English would allow no liberties to be taken, yet their desire was to treat them with kindness.

Notwithstanding these assurances, the next morning very few natives came near the ship, and she was consequently warped closer in, more effectually to protect the intended fort. Before long, however, the natives got over their alarm, and the two chiefs Tubourai Tamaide and Tootahah returned, bringing in their canoes not branches only, but two young trees, and would not venture on board till these had been received as emblems of peace. They each also brought, as propitiatory gifts, a hog and bread-fruit ready dressed—both very acceptable articles at that time. In return, a hatchet and a nail were given to each of them.

At this time the expedition had the misfortune to lose Mr Buchan, the landscape-painter brought out by Mr Banks.

Rapid progress was made with the forts, and on April 18, Mr Banks’s tent being set up, he slept on shore for the first time. The natives had by this time completely recovered from their alarm, and an abundance of provisions was offered for sale. Their friend Tubourai Tamaide even brought his wife and family to the fort, and did not hesitate to throw himself down and sleep on Mr Banks’s bed. The voyagers were gradually gaining an insight into the manners and customs of the people. Mr Monkhouse, in one of his walks, learned their mode of treating their dead. He found the body of the poor man who had been shot. It was wrapped in cloth, and placed on a high platform supported by stakes, with a roof over it; near it were some instruments of war and other articles. Two other bodies were seen near, in a similar position, the bones of which were perfectly dry. The first was near the hut in which the man had lived. On the approach of the white man to the bodies the natives showed considerable uneasiness, and seemed greatly relieved when the examination was over.

A few days afterwards Tootahah amused them by a concert. There were four performers on flutes having two stops, which were sounded by application to the end of the nose, instead of the mouth; one nostril being stopped by the hand.

Longer excursions from the shore than they had at first ventured to take gave the explorers a good notion of the fertility and resources of the country. After passing a belt of fertile land, about two miles wide, they came to a range of barren hills. These being crossed, they descended into a wide plain, watered by a river issuing from a fertile valley, which was nearly a hundred yards wide, and at a considerable distance from the sea.

This plain was thickly studded over with houses, the inhabitants of which seemed to live in the full enjoyment of the ample productions of their country. As they became better acquainted with the people, it was discovered that, amiable as the people appeared, they had many vicious habits. They were generally expert and pertinacious thieves, although some of the chiefs appear to have been exempt from this vice, or to have been ashamed of practising it on their liberal visitors.

The fort was completed on April 26, and six swivel guns were mounted on it. This seemed very naturally to excite the apprehensions of the people, and some fishermen who lived near wisely moved farther off. Owhaw, indeed, intimated by signs that the English would begin to fire their guns in four days. Notwithstanding this, Tubourai Tamaide and other chiefs, with their wives, came into the fort and ate without showing any signs of fear. Again the commander’s patience was tried by the misconduct of one of his own people. The butcher had taken a fancy to a stone hatchet in the hands of the wife of the above-named chief, and because she refused to give it to him for a nail, he threatened to kill her. Being proved guilty of this crime, as well as of an infraction of the rules drawn up by the commander, he received a severe flogging, in the presence of a number of the natives. It speaks well for their kind feelings that when they saw the first strokes given they begged that the rest of his punishment might be remitted, and when Captain Cook would not consent to this they burst into tears. Indeed, numberless instances proved that these people were mere children of impulse. They had never been taught to disguise or suppress their feelings; easily affected by all the changes of the passing hour, their sorrows were transient, and their joy and pleasure speedily excited. Unaccustomed to dwell on the past, or to allow themselves to be troubled with thoughts of the future, all they desired was to gratify the desire of the moment. About this time—the beginning of May—an event occurred which threatened disappointment to the object of the expedition. This was the disappearance, from the middle of the fort, of the quadrant, a large instrument in a case, on which the possibility of making the proposed observations entirely depended. Search was instantly made in every direction, and at length, through the intervention of the friendly chiefs, portions were discovered in the possession of the natives. They had been carried off by different people, but fortunately, not broken, and finally all the parts were collected and the instruments set up. At the suggestion of the Earl of Morton, before leaving home, Captain Cook sent out two parties to observe the transit of Venus from different situations—one to the east, the other to the westward. The anxiety for such weather as would be favourable to the success of the experiment was powerfully felt by all parties concerned; they could not sleep the preceding night; but their apprehensions were removed by the sun’s rising without a cloud on the eventful morning of June 3. The weather continued with equal clearness throughout the day, so that the observations at each post were successfully made. At the fort Captain Cook, Mr Green, and Dr Solander were stationed. The passage of the planet Venus over the sun’s disc was observed with great advantage.

The explorers had been, from the first, anxious to see the person who had been looked upon by Captain Wallis as the queen of the island, and at length, a number of people being collected at the tents, Mr Mollineux, the master, declared that one of the females, who was sitting quietly among the rest, was the lady herself. She, at the same time, acknowledged him to be one of the strangers she had before seen. Her name, they soon learned, was Oberea. She was tall and stout, and must have been handsome in her youth. Her countenance indicated much intelligence, and she was also unusually fair. She was thenceforth treated with great attention, and many presents were offered her. It was curious that among them all she seemed to value most a child’s doll. On this, Tootahah, who was apparently at that time the principal chief on the island, jealous of the favours shown to Oberea, was not content till he also had a doll given to him. For the moment he valued it more than a hatchet, probably supposing that its possession conferred some mark of dignity; or perhaps he took it for one of the gods of the white men. Whatever the position really held by Oberea, her moral conduct was not superior to that of most of her countrywomen. She seems to have been the repudiated wife of Oamo, one of the principal chiefs of the island. There appeared to have been three brothers, chiefs—Whappai, the eldest, Oamo, and Tootahah. As soon as a son is born to a head chief, he succeeds as king, and generally the father becomes regent. Whappai had a son who was thus king, but Tootahah, having distinguished himself as a leader in battle, was chosen as regent instead of Whappai, and a son of Oamo and Oberea was the heir-apparent. It was thus manifest to our voyagers that even among those simple savages—“the children of nature” as they were sometimes called—ambition for greatness and jealousy of power were passions not unknown nor unfelt, any more than they are among civilised and highly cultivated nations and races of men.

Among the attendants of Oberea was Tupia, who had been her minister in the days of her power, and was now a priest, and possessed of considerable influence. He from the first attached himself to the English, and soon expressed a strong desire to accompany them whenever they should leave the country. As it was very important to have an intelligent native of a South Sea island attached to the expedition, Captain Cook gladly availed himself of this desire, and Tupia was subsequently received on board the Endeavour as interpreter.

During his first visit to the island, Captain Cook learned very little about the religion of the people. He came to the conclusion that they believed in one God or Creator of the universe, and in a number of subordinate deities, called Etuas, as also in a separate state of existence with different degrees of happiness. They did not seem to fancy that their deities took any notice of their actions. Their religion, such as it was, had therefore no restraining influence over them. Their priests were called Tahowas. The office was hereditary. All ranks belonged to it. The chief priest was generally the younger brother of a good family, and was respected in a degree next to the king. Of the little knowledge existing in the country the priests possessed the greatest share, especially with regard to navigation and astronomy. The name Tahowa signifies, indeed, a man of knowledge. Like all heathen superstitions, their system was one of imposture; and the priests supported their authority by cunning, and by working on the credulity of the people. Captain Cook was not aware at that time that it was their custom to offer up human sacrifices, and that they exercised a fearful influence over the people by selecting for victims those who had in any way offended them. The persons fixed on, often young men or girls in the pride and strength of youth, were followed, unsuspicious of the fate awaiting them, and were struck down by the clubs of the assistant priests without warning. They were then offered up at their morais to the Etuas, whose anger they desired to propitiate. The priests professed also to cure diseases by incantations very similar to those practised by the medicine-men or mystery-men among the Indians of North America. A society existed, called the Arreoy, the object of which was to set at defiance all the laws of morality which the rest of the people acknowledged. Many of the principal people of the island belonged to it. By its rules any woman becoming a mother was compelled instantly to strangle her infant. Both Captain Cook and Mr Banks spoke to some who acknowledged that they had thus destroyed several children, and, far from considering it as a disgrace, declared that it was a privilege to belong to the association. For a long period this dissolute society existed, and opposed all the efforts of the Christian missionaries to get it abolished. From the lowest to the highest, the people were addicted to thieving; for even the principal chiefs could not resist temptation when it came in their way. On one of their expeditions Mr Banks and his companions had the greater part of their clothes stolen from them while they were asleep. They had no doubt that Oberea was concerned in the robbery.

Still the people possessed qualities which won the regard of their visitors. In all their habits they were scrupulously clean. They regularly bathed three times in the day, washed their mouths before and after eating, and their hands frequently during each meal. It was the custom for the chiefs to take their meals alone, seated on the ground, with leaves instead of a cloth spread before them, and their food ready cooked in a basket by their side. Their chief animal food consisted of pigs and dogs, the latter being carefully kept for the purpose, and fed entirely on vegetable diet. It was agreed that South Sea dog was but little inferior to English lamb. The meat was either broiled or baked in earth-ovens. A hole was dug in the ground, and a fire lighted in it, small stones being mixed with the wood. When the hole was sufficiently hot, the fire was raked out, and a layer of hot stones placed at the bottom; on this leaves were put. The animal to be cooked was laid on the top of them, and covered, first with more leaves, and then with the remainder of the hot stones; the whole being then covered up with earth. All the fish and flesh eaten by the natives was baked in the same way.

An excursion in the pinnace, made by Captain Cook and Mr Banks, round the island, gave them a perfect knowledge of its shape and size. It consists of two peninsulas joined by a narrow neck of land, and was found to be about thirty leagues in circumference. Though they were received in a very friendly way, the natives stole their clothes or whatever they could lay hands on. On this excursion they met with a representation of one of their Etuas, or deities. It was the figure of a man constructed of basket-work, rudely made, and rather more than seven feet high. The wicker skeleton was completely covered with feathers, which were white where the skin was to appear, and black in the parts which it is their custom to paint or stain. On the head was a representation of hair; there were also four protuberances, three in front and one behind, which the English would have called horns, but which were called by the natives Tate Ete (little men).

In the northern peninsula they visited a burying-place, the pavement of which was extremely neat; upon it was raised a pyramid five feet high, covered with the fruit of two plants peculiar to the country. Near the pyramid, under a shed, was a small image of stone, of very rude workmanship—the first specimen of stone-carving which had been seen among the people. Continuing their voyage, they came to a district belonging to Oberea, and were entertained at her house, which, though small, was very neat. Not far from it they saw an enormous pile, which they were told was the morai of Oamo and Oberea, literally their burying-place and temple. It was a pile of stone-work, raised pyramidically upon an oblong base or square two hundred and sixty-seven feet long and eighty-seven wide. It was like the small mounds erected for sun-dials, with steps leading on all sides to the summit. The steps at the sides were broader than those at the ends, and it terminated in a ridge like the roof of a house. There were eleven steps, each four feet high, so that the height of the pile was forty-four feet; each course was formed of white coral stone, neatly squared and polished; the rest of the mass, for there was no hollow within, consisted of round pebbles. Some of the coral stones were measured, and found to be three feet and a half by two feet and a half. The foundation was of stones squared, and one of them measured four feet seven inches by two feet four inches. It was surprising that such a structure should have been raised without iron tools to shape the stones, or mortar to join them. The quarried stones must have been brought from a considerable distance by hand, and the coral must have been raised from under the water, where, though there is an abundance, it is at a depth of never less than three feet. To square these stones must have been a work of incredible labour, though the polishing might have been more easily effected by means of the sharp coral sand from the sea-shore. The whole pyramid was not straight, but formed a slight curve, and made one side of a spacious area or square of three hundred and sixty feet by three hundred and fifty-four feet, enclosed by a stone wall, and paved throughout its whole extent with flat stones. Several trees, called etoa and plantains, were growing through the pavement. On the top of the pyramid stood the figure of a bird carved in wood, and near it lay the broken figure of a fish carved in stone. About a hundred yards to the west of this building was another paved court, in which were several small stages raised on wooden pillars seven feet high. These were altars, called Ewattas, and upon them were placed provisions of all sorts as offerings to their gods. In the neighbourhood of the morai were found large numbers of human bones. These were said to have been the remains of the inhabitants killed a few months before by the people of Tirrabou, in the south-east peninsula, who had made a sudden descent on the coast. The jaw-bones had been carried away as trophies, as the Indians of North America carry off the scalps of their enemies. The natives conjectured, probably, that the English would not approve of human sacrifices, and therefore refrained from offering up any, or did so only when they knew that their visitors would not interrupt them in their horrible proceedings.

The inhabitants of Otaheite were remarkably intelligent, and their minds were capable of a high state of cultivation. The climate was considered healthy, and the natural productions of the island abundant. The bread-fruit was, perhaps, the most valuable. They had also cocoanuts, thirteen sorts of bananas, plantains; a fruit not unlike an apple, sweet potatoes, yams, cacao; a kind of arum, the yambu, the sugar-cane; a fruit growing in a pod, like a large kidney bean; the pandana tree, which produces fruit like the pine-apple, and numerous edible roots of nutritious quality. Among other trees must be mentioned the Chinese paper-mulberry, from which their cloth was, and is still, manufactured, and two species of fig-trees. There were no serpents and no wild quadrupeds on the island, except rats. Their tame animals were hogs, dogs, and poultry, and there were wild ducks, pigeons, paroquets, and a few other birds. The complexion of the people was olive or light brown; that of the women of the upper classes being very clear, with well-formed faces and expressive eyes, the nose only being flatter than is admired in Europe. In their persons, as already observed, they were remarkably cleanly; and they certainly showed that they were neither treacherous nor revengeful. Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and Captain Cook himself, were constantly in their power, often in their villages, sleeping in separate huts, without any watch or guard.

Contrary to the usual custom, the men wore their hair long or tied up in a bunch, while the women wore it cropped short round their ears. The bodies of both sexes were tattooed, but not their faces. They manufactured three sorts of cloth for dress. The finest and whitest was made from the paper-mulberry tree, and was used for the dresses of the chief people. The second, used by the common people, was made from the bread-fruit tree, and the third from a tree resembling a fig-tree. The latter was coarse and harsh, and of the colour of the darkest brown paper; but it was valuable because it resisted the wet, while the others did not. The women of the upper class wore three pieces of cloth; one, eleven yards long and two wide, was wrapped round the waist, and hung down like a petticoat; while the two others were formed like the South American poncho, the head being put through a hole in the middle, so as to leave the arms at liberty. The men dressed in much the same way, except that instead of allowing the cloth to hang down like a petticoat, they brought it between their legs so as to have some resemblance to breeches. The higher a person’s rank, the more clothes he wore, some throwing a large piece loosely over the shoulders. They shaded their eyes from the sun with hats made at the moment required, of cocoanut leaves or matting, and the women sometimes wore small turbans, or a head-dress which consisted of long plaited threads of human hair, wound round and round, with flowers of various kinds stuck between the folds, especially the Cape jessamine, which was always planted near their houses. The chiefs sometimes wore the tail feathers of birds stuck upright in their hair. Their personal ornaments besides flowers were few; but both sexes wore ear-rings of shells, stones, berries, or small pearls.

Their houses were always built in woods, sufficient space only being cleared to prevent the droppings from the boughs from rotting the roofs. They were simply formed of three rows of parallel stakes for the support of the roof, the highest part of which was only nine feet from the ground, while the eaves reached to within three feet and a half. The houses were thatched with palm-leaves, and the floor was covered some inches deep with soft hay. They were, indeed, scarcely used for any other purpose than as dormitories, the people living almost constantly in the open air. The great chiefs, however, had houses in which privacy could be enjoyed; and there were guest-houses for the reception of visitors, or for the accommodation of the people of a whole district. Some were two hundred feet long, thirty broad, and twenty high under the ridge; on one side of them was an area enclosed with low palings. They were maintained at the public expense.

The style of cookery among these islanders has already been described. They baked in their earth-ovens hogs and large fish, as also the bread-fruit. The baked pork and fish were considered more juicy and more equally done than by any mode of cooking known at home. Of the bread-fruit they made various dishes, by putting to it either water or the milk of the cocoanut, and then beating it to a paste with a stone pestle, and afterwards mixing it with ripe plantains and bananas. They made an intoxicating beverage from a plant they called Ava. The chiefs only indulged in the vice of drinking to excess, and even they considered it a disgrace to be seen intoxicated. They sometimes drank together, and vied with each other in taking the greatest number of draughts, each draught being about a pint. They ate a prodigious quantity of food at each meal, and would finish off by swallowing a quart of pounded bread-fruit of the consistency of custard.

They had various amusements, and were especially fond of dancing, in which they kept admirable time, their movements being often graceful; but their gestures too generally showed the very debased condition of their morals. Their musical instruments were flutes and drums. The flutes were made of hollow bamboo, about a foot long. The drums were blocks of wood of cylindrical form, solid at one end, but scooped out and covered at the other with shark’s skin. They were beaten by the hands instead of sticks. The natives sang to these instruments, and often made extempore verses.

The men delighted especially in wrestling. They also practised archery and spear-throwing. They shot, not at a mark, but to try how far they could send an arrow; their spears, however, they threw at a mark, generally the bole of a plantain, at the distance of twenty yards. These spears were about nine feet long. They also, in war, used clubs of hard wood, often well carved, and six or seven feet long; pikes, headed with the stings of sting-rays; and slings, which they wielded with great dexterity. Thus armed, they fought with obstinacy and fury, and gave no quarter to man, woman, or child who, while their passion lasted, fell into their hands. Although they could not be said to live under a regular form of government, there was a certain subordination established among them, not unlike that of European nations under the feudal system.

Their tools were few and rude: an adze of stone, a chisel or gouge of bone—generally that of a man’s arm between the wrist and elbow—a rasp of coral, and the sting of a sting-ray, with coral sand as a file or polisher. With these tools they built their houses and canoes, hewed stone, and felled, clove, carved, and polished timber. Their axes were of different sizes, but even with the largest it took them several days to cut down a tree. The canoes were often large, and constructed with great labour and ingenuity. They were of two builds: one, the Ivaha, for short excursions, was wall-sided, with a flat bottom; the other, the Pahie, for longer voyages, was bow-sided, with a sharp bottom. There was the fighting Ivaha, the fishing Ivaha, and the travelling Ivaha. The fighting Ivaha was the largest; the head and stern were raised sometimes seventeen feet or more above the sides, which were only three feet out of the water. Two of these vessels were always secured together by strong poles about three feet apart. Towards the head a platform was raised, about twelve feet long, wider than the boats, and on this platform stood the fighting men, armed with slings and spears; for they did not use their bows and arrows except for amusement. Below the stage the rowers sat with reserved men, who supplied the place of those that were wounded. Some of their war canoes had stages or decks from one end to the other. The fighting Pahie was often sixty feet long, and two were also joined together, with a large platform above them. One measured by Captain Cook was, though sixty feet long, only one foot and a half at the gunwale, with flat sides; then it abruptly widened out to three feet, and narrowed again to the keel. The double canoes were sometimes out a month together, going from island to island. Some carried one, some two masts, with sails of matting, of shoulder-of-mutton shape. The bottom of a large Pahie was formed of three or more trunks of trees secured together and hollowed out, above this flooring were the sides of plank, two inches thick, and about fifteen inches broad; and then there were the upper works, hollowed out of trunks of trees like the bottom. Sometimes these canoes were used singly, but then they were fitted with outriggers like the flying Proa of the Ladrone Islands. The outrigger is a log of wood fixed at the end of two poles, which lie across the vessel, projecting eight or ten feet, according to her size. The length and high sterns of these canoes gave them great advantage in putting off from the shore through the surf; they also sailed and paddled very fast. The amount of time and labour expended in the construction of one of these canoes must have been very great, and speaks well for the intelligence as well as for the industry and perseverance of the islanders.

Before quitting the island, Mr Banks planted a quantity of seeds of water-melons, oranges, lemons, limes, and other plants and trees which he had collected at Rio de Janeiro. He had prepared the ground for them in the neighbourhood of the fort, in as many varieties of soil as he could select. He also gave away seeds liberally to the natives, and planted others in the woods. The plants from some melon-seeds which were sown on their first arrival were flourishing, and the natives eagerly begged for more.

Many articles manufactured by the natives have not yet been described. The mode of making cloth from the bark of the paper-mulberry was curious. When the trees were of a fit size, they were pulled up, and the tops and roots being cut off, the bark was slit longitudinally, and was this easily removed. It was then placed under stones in running water. When sufficiently softened, the coarser parts were scraped away with a shell, the fine fibres of the inner coat only remaining. They were then placed on plantain-leaves, in lengths of about twelve yards, one by the side of the other, for about a foot in width. Two or three layers were also placed one on the other, care being taken that the thickness should be equal throughout. In this state it remained till the following morning, when all the water it contained being drained off or evaporated, the fibres were found to adhere so closely together that the whole piece could be lifted up and carried home. There it was placed on a long, smooth board, to be beaten by the women. The instrument they used was a four-sided piece of wood, with a long handle. This mallet was scored with grooves of different finenesses, those on one side being wide enough to receive a small pack-thread, the size of the grooves diminishing by degrees till those on the last side were fine as the finest silk. The fabric was beaten with the coarser side first, the women keeping time, and it spread rapidly under their strokes. The finest side was the last used, and the groove marked the cloth so as to give it the appearance of having been made of fine thread. It was then almost as thin as English muslin, and became very white on being bleached in the air. The scarlet dye used was very brilliant, and was extracted from the juice of a species of fig; a duller red was from the leaves of another tree. A yellow pigment was extracted from the root of the Morinda citrifolia. A brown and a black dye were also used.

The natives, when visited by Cook, manufactured mats of various descriptions, some of them exceedingly fine and beautiful. One sort served them for clothing in wet weather. They made also coarse mats of rushes and grass, to sit or sleep on, plaiting them with great rapidity and facility. They produced every variety of basket-work of great beauty; they also made ropes and string of all sorts; their fishing-line, made from the bark of a species of nettle, was far stronger than any English line of the same thickness. Their fishing-nets, though coarse, answered their purpose. They were often eighty fathoms in length. Harpoons, made of cane, were used to catch fish, and fish-hooks of mother-of-pearl. One used for trawling had a white tuft of dog’s or hog’s hair attached to it, to look like the tail of a fish. The fishermen watched for the birds which always follow a shoal of bonetas, and seldom returned without a prize. Both sexes were expert swimmers, and would dash out through the fiercest foam, diving under the breaking seas as they rolled in, and coming up on the other side. One of their amusements was to tow out a small raft on which they would sit, and allow themselves to be carried in on the top of a high foaming sea, amid which no boat could live for an instant. They were not without the comfort of artificial light. Their candles were made of the kernels of a kind of oily nut, which were stuck one over another on a skewer running through the middle. The upper one being lighted burnt down to the second, which took fire, the part of the skewer which went through the first being consumed, and so on to the last. These candles burnt a considerable time, and gave a very tolerable light.

From the brief description which has been given of their manufactures it will be seen that the islanders of Otaheite possessed a considerable number of the conveniences of life. Had they but been blessed with true religion and a good government, they would already have had most of the elements of a happy existence, without further intercourse with the rest of the world.

That a life such as was apparently led by these South Sea islanders—a life of comparative ease, and in a luxurious and enervating but inviting climate—should have presented charms to such men as chiefly composed the crew of the Endeavour, can excite no surprise. Rude, ignorant, and, for the most part, vicious themselves, in spite of the boasted civilisation of their country, they saw nothing repulsive in the rudeness, ignorance, and vices of the dusky natives. On the other hand, they were attracted by visions of indolence and savage freedom from care. Some of them also had formed attachments not easy to be broken; and they were willing to barter their distant homes, connections, and prospects for the licentious pleasures so near at hand. It was very difficult for them to resist these enticements; and notwithstanding the vigilance of the commander of the expedition, two marines managed to desert from the ship. In order to recover these deserters, Captain Cook thought himself under the necessity of detaining several of the principal people of the island on board the Endeavour. This led to reprisals; for on a party being sent on shore to bring off the deserters, they were, in turn, seized by the natives, who made it understood that they should not be restored till their chiefs were set at liberty. A stronger party was consequently sent from the ship, with a message from Tootahah (one of the captives), desiring that the Englishmen should be released. This, happily, had the desired effect, and the deserters, as well as the other men, were immediately sent back. Thus, in this, as in previous transactions, the prudence and mildness of the islanders averted a quarrel which, had it proceeded to extremities, would have left the civilised visitors little to boast of, beyond the superior power they possessed. And it must be a source of deep regret to every Christian reader that in the protracted intercourse which had been

carried on between these professed Christians on the one hand, and the poor heathens on the other, not one attempt, so far as is known, had been made to impart a knowledge of that glorious Being who is the “Light of the world” and “the Saviour of men;” nor of God the Holy Spirit, who is the Giver of the only true and eternal life. The scientific objects of the voyage had, indeed, thus far been successful, and, to a great extent, had been rendered so by the goodwill of the islanders; but to the silent appeal for religious teaching and spiritual aid made to the philosophers of that party by the ignorance of their hosts there was no reply.

The fort was now completely dismantled, and preparations were made for sailing. At a last interview with the chiefs, all differences were settled, and the voyagers parted from the islanders on the most friendly terms. The latter, indeed, were loud in their demonstrations of grief. Tupia, who still adhered to his determination of sailing in the Endeavour, though he shed tears, bade farewell to his countrymen in a dignified manner, and as far as he was able, concealed the sorrow he evidently felt. The Endeavour had remained exactly three months at the island. It was high time for her to leave; for the season for cocoanuts and bread-fruit being over, the natives could no longer spare any of their provisions for the strangers. Tupia, who had gone on shore, returned again on board with his servant, a lad of thirteen, called Tayeto, and on July 13, 1769, the Endeavour sailed from Otaheite to continue her voyage towards the west.

Tupia informed Captain Cook that four islands, called Huaheine, Ulietea, Otaha, and Bolabola, lay at the distance of between one and two days’ sail of Otaheite, and that refreshments in abundance might be procured at them. In consequence, however, of light winds, the Endeavour did not get off Huaheine till the morning of the 16th. Tupia probably fancied that he could impose on the white men as he did on his own people, for in his character of priest he began to offer prayers, or rather to perform incantations, as soon as he saw the prospect of a breeze springing up.

Upon the ship’s getting close in with the land, several canoes came off, but kept at a distance till they discovered Tupia. In one of them were Oree, king of the island, and his wife. On receiving reiterated assurances that they would be treated as friends, they ventured on board. Though at first struck with astonishment at what they saw, they soon became familiar with their visitors, and the king expressed his wish to change names with the captain, who was henceforth called Captain Oree, while the chief took the name of King Cookee. The ship having anchored in a small, excellent harbour called Owharee, the captain, Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and Mr Monkhouse, with Tupia and King Cookee, went on shore. On landing Tupia stripped himself to the waist, and desired Mr Monkhouse, whom he seems to have looked on as a brother priest, to do the same; and sitting down in a large guest-house, full of people, opposite the king, he began a sort of incantation, the king answering in what appeared to be set responses. During this he made presents of some handkerchiefs, beads, two bunches of feathers, and plantains to the Etua, or god of the island, and received in return a hog, two bunches of feathers, and some young plantains, as presents to the white man’s God. (Note 3.)

These he ordered to be carried on board. On the treaty, as the ceremony was supposed to be, being concluded, every one went his way, and Tupia repaired to worship at a morai. The next day, as Tupia was much engaged with his friends in the island, the captain and Mr Banks took Tayeto as their companion in their rambles. The most interesting object they met with was a chest or cask, the lid of which was nicely sewed on, and neatly thatched with palm-leaves. It was fixed on two horizontal poles, and supported on arches of wood neatly carved. The object of the poles seemed to be to remove it from place to place. There was a circular hole at one end, stopped, when it was first seen, with cloth. The chest was, on a second visit, found to be empty. The general resemblance between it and the ark of the Lord among the Jews was remarkable. The boy called it Ewharre no Etua (the house of the god). He, however, could give no account of its use.

Some hogs were exchanged for axes, and some medals bestowed on the king, and no accident having happened to mar their friendly intercourse with the natives, the voyagers took their departure. The people were superior in size and appearance to the general run of the natives of Otaheite, and the women fairer and better-looking. Not having experienced the effects of the guns of the Dolphin, they were less timid than the people of Otaheite, and did not fall down on hearing a musket fired. On one of them being detected in thieving, his companions prescribed a good beating, which was at once administered.

The next island visited was Ulietea, where, within the coral reef, the ship anchored in a good harbour. Two canoes at once came off, each bringing a woman and a pig—the one as a mark of confidence, the other as a present. The ladies each received a spike-nail and some beads, greatly to their delight. On landing, the Union-Jack was hoisted, and the three islands in sight taken possession of in the name of his Britannic Majesty. Here was a large morai, called Tapodeboatea, which was visited, and found to be different from those of Otaheite. It consisted only of four walls, eight feet high, built of coral stones—some of immense size—enclosing an area of five-and-twenty yards square, filled up with smaller stones. On the top of it many carved planks were set on end, and at a little distance was an altar, on which lay a hog of about eighty pounds weight, roasted whole, supposed to have been a sacrifice. Round it were four or five arks resting on poles like that seen at Huaheine. In the interior of one of them Mr Banks found a package done up tightly in mats. He had opened several folds, but the last resisted all his attempts; and as he saw that his proceeding gave great offence, he was compelled to desist. Not far off was a long house, where, among rolls of cloth, was the model of a canoe, about three feet long, to which were tied eight human jaw-bones. Other jaw-bones were seen near the ark, and Tupia affirmed that they were those of natives of the island.

Bad weather detained the ship in the harbour of Oopoa for two more days, and when at length she got out, she was in imminent danger of striking on a reef, having got unexpectedly close to the edge of one, which was discovered from the water being shallow on one side, though deep enough under the keel to float her. Some time was expended in endeavouring to beat up to an anchorage off Bolabola, and several smaller islands were visited.

A leak having been discovered, and some more ballast being required, Captain Cook put into a harbour in Ulietea, at the opposite side of the island to that he had before visited. While the ship’s company were taking in ballast and water, Mr Banks and Dr Solander went on shore, and were everywhere received with the greatest respect by the natives, who seemed conscious that their white visitors had the power, though not the desire, to do them every possible harm. Men, women, and children crowded round them, and followed them wherever they went; but no one was guilty of the least incivility. On the contrary, the men vied with each other in lifting them over any dirt or water in the way.

On approaching the first house, they saw the people arrange themselves on either side of a long mat spread on the ground, at the farther end of which sat some young girls and very pretty children, dressed with the greatest neatness and taste, who kept their position, evidently expecting the strangers to come up and make them presents. At one house, at the end of a mat thirty feet long, sat a girl about six years old; her dress was red, and a large quantity of plaited hair was wound round her head. She was leaning on the arm of a good-looking woman, supposed to be her nurse. The gentlemen walked up to her, and as soon as they approached she stretched out her hands for the beads which they offered, and received them with a grace which no princess in Europe could have surpassed. The people, in consequence of these gifts, seemed to be so pleased with their visitors that they employed every means in their power to amuse them. The master of one of the houses where they stopped ordered a dance to be performed before them, different from any they had yet witnessed. It was executed by one man, who put on a high head-dress of feathers, edged round with sharks’ teeth. As he moved slowly round he made it describe a circle, bringing it often close to the faces of the spectators so as to make them start back, always to the great amusement of the rest.

In the course of their walk the next day they met a company of dancers—two women and six men, with three drums—who were making a tour of the island for their own amusement, for they received no pay, and were said by Tupia to be among the principal people of the country. The women wore graceful head-dresses of long braids of hair and flowers. The upper parts of their bodies were without clothing; but they were amply clothed from the breast downwards in black, and they wore pearls in their ears. The dances were of the immoral kind general in the islands. Regular dramas were also represented before the strangers.

It appeared that the island had lately been conquered by the subjects of Opoony, King of Bolabola, whose acquaintance Captain Cook wished to make. Instead of seeing a fine-looking warrior as he had expected, he found a withered, decrepit wretch, half blind with age; yet it seemed that he was the terror of all the surrounding islands.

A good supply of hogs, poultry, and other provisions having been obtained at Ulietea, and her leak being stopped, the Endeavour sailed on August 9. As Bolabola was difficult of access, Captain Cook gave up his intention of touching there. To gratify Tupia, however, he fired a shot towards the island, though it was seven leagues distant. The object of Tupia appeared to be that of showing his resentment against the king of that island, as well as of exhibiting the power of his new allies.

To the six islands which had been visited or seen, namely, Ulietea, Otaha, Bolabola, Huaheine, Tubai, and Maurua, Captain Cook gave the name of the Society Islands. Otaheite was not included in the group, but continued to be known as King George’s Island. (Note 1.)

The voyagers were much disappointed in finding that they could not keep their live-stock. The hogs would not eat European grain of any sort, nor bread-dust; and the fowls were seized with a disease which made them hold their heads between their legs till they died.

Nothing worthy of notice occurred till the 13th, when an island, called, by Tupia, Oheteroa, was seen. The next morning Mr Gore was sent in the pinnace to attempt a landing, accompanied by Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and Tupia. As the boat approached the land a number of natives, armed with long lances, appeared. The main body sat down, while two walked abreast of the boat as she pulled along the shore. At length they leaped into the water and swam towards the boat, but were left behind. Two others followed, but were soon distanced. At last, one man, running on, got up to the boat. Mr Banks, wishing to gain the goodwill of the natives by kind treatment, urged Mr Gore to take him in; but he declined doing so. On the English attempting to land, soon after this, several natives came off in a canoe and boarded the boat, evidently with the intention of capturing her; indeed, it was not till muskets were fired over their heads that the savages leaped out and swam ashore. As no harbour or good landing-place was discovered in the circuit of the island, and as the natives were everywhere hostile, the attempt to land was abandoned. The clothing of the inhabitants was considered superior to that of the natives of the islands before visited. The cloth of which their dresses were made was richly coloured. One piece of red or yellow was crossed on the breast, and sewed round the waist as a sash. They had also head-dresses of white or lead-coloured cloth, shaped like a small turban; and some wore the feathers of the native birds round their heads. They had well-finished lances in their hands, twenty feet long, and highly carved and polished clubs and pikes. The canoe also, though small, was richly carved; and her head and stern were ornamented with white feathers. Tupia stated that there were numerous islands between the south and north-west, at different distances from Oheteroa; and that there was one, three days’ sail to the north-east, called Manua, or Bird Island. The most distant island with which he was acquainted to the south was Mouton, but his father had told him of islands to the south of that. But considering the uncertainty of this information, Captain Cook determined not to lose time in looking for islands, but to steer to the south in search of a continent.

In leaving these islands we cannot help expressing regret that the voyagers were so forgetful, as they appear to have been, of their obligations to the religion they professed, and of the eternal welfare of those among whom they sojourned. They found a people sunk in idolatry and superstition, and should have endeavoured to do as the Apostle Paul did at Athens, where, finding an altar inscribed “To the unknown God,” he said to the assembled multitude, “Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you,” and then began to preach Jesus Christ and His great salvation. But so far from imitating this example, they, in many instances, took part in their idolatrous and superstitious ceremonies. It is vain to attempt an excuse of these Englishmen by saying either that it was the fashion of the times to pass

by the heathen without a thought for their wretched lost condition, or that the party of philosophers and scientific men and discoverers were not Christian missionaries. Every Christian ought to look upon himself as a missionary, when work for his Lord can be done by him; and it was a bad fashion to follow, surely, that of suffering heathens to perish without one effort made for their salvation. No doubt there were great physical and natural impediments in the way of Cook and his associates making anything known to the natives of those islands; but these impediments were overcome in relation to other matters.

The Endeavour sailed from Oheteroa on August 15, 1769. The 25th was the first anniversary of the day she had quitted the shores of England. To celebrate it a Cheshire cheese was cut, and a cask of porter broached, and both were found excellent. Those who have been long at sea and away from home can best understand the importance attached to such trifles, and the pleasure they afford.

On the morning of the 30th a comet was seen in the east, a little above the horizon. Tupia, who observed it with others, instantly cried out that as soon as the people of Bolabola perceived it they would attack the inhabitants of Uhetea, who would have to fly to the mountains to save their lives. Meeting with a heavy sea and strong gales from the westward, on September 1 Captain Cook wore and stood to the northward. On the weather moderating he continued his course to the westward during the whole of September. Several seals were seen asleep on the surface of the water, and various birds were perceived, a sure indication that the ship was approaching land. On October 6 land was seen from the mast-head, bearing west by north. In the evening it could be seen from the deck. It was not till the evening of the next day that the voyagers got near enough to observe the nature of the country, when it appeared of great extent, with four or five ranges of hills rising one over the other, and beyond them a lofty chain of mountains. The general opinion was that they had found the Terra Australia incognita. A bay was seen, and smoke rising from the shore, but night coming on, they were obliged to stand off till daylight. The next day, on standing in again, some small but neat houses were seen, and a considerable number of people seated on the beach. Farther on was discovered a tolerably high and regular paling, enclosing the whole of the top of a hill. Some on board supposed it to be a park for deer, others an enclosure for oxen or sheep. In the afternoon the ship came to an anchor in a bay off the mouth of a river. The sides of the bay were white cliffs of great height; the middle was low land, with hills rising behind and terminating in a chain of lofty mountains.

Captain Cook, with Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and a party of men in the yawl and pinnace, landed on the east side of the river; but some people being perceived on the west side, the yawl crossed over, and while the gentlemen landed, four boys were left in charge of her. On the approach of the Englishmen the natives ran away, and the former advanced towards some huts two or three hundred yards from the water’s edge. When, however, they had got some distance from the yawl, four men with long lances rushed out of the woods towards her, and would have cut her off had not the people in the pinnace covered them, and called to the boys to drop down the stream. This they did, but the natives pursued in spite of two musket-shots fired at them. At length, one of the natives was poising his spear to dart it at the boys, when the coxswain of the pinnace fired a third time, and shot the native dead. The other three at first attempted to drag off the dead body, but fear soon made them drop it and take to flight.

On the captain and his companions returning to the boat they stopped to examine the body, which had been shot through the heart. It was that of a man of middle stature, of a brown, but not very dark complexion. One side of his face was tattooed in spiral lines of regular figure, and his hair tied in a knot on the top of his head, but no feathers in it. He wore a garment of a fine cloth, of a manufacture new to the English. When the voyagers returned on board, they could hear the natives talking very loudly. The next day the captain and the same party landed with Tupia, and the marines were afterwards sent for. A large body of natives had collected on the opposite side of the river, apparently unarmed; but on the approach of the English they started up, each man holding a spear or dart, and made signs to the strangers to depart. The marines being drawn up, the visitors again approached the natives, when Tupia addressed them in the language of Otaheite, which they perfectly understood. He told them that their visitors wanted provisions and water, and would pay them with iron, the properties of which he explained as well as he could. They replied that they were willing to trade if the English would cross over to them. Captain Cook consented to do this, provided they would put aside their arms. This they would not consent to do. Tupia warned the English, during the conversation, that the natives were not friendly. Captain Cook then invited the natives to come across to them. At last, one of them stripped himself and swam over without his arms. He was soon after followed by others, to the number of twenty, most of whom came armed; and though iron and beads were offered them, they set no value apparently on either, for a few feathers were offered in return, and they at once showed their hostile disposition by endeavouring to snatch the weapons from the hands of their visitors. They were told, through Tupia, that if they continued to proceed in that manner they would be killed; notwithstanding this, one of them seized Mr Green’s hanger from his side, and ran off with it. Mr Banks on this fired at him with small shot; but though hit, he still continued to wave the hanger round his head. Mr Monkhouse, seeing this, fired at him with ball, when he instantly dropped. Upon this, the main body, who had retired to a rock in the middle of the river, began to return. Two that were near the man who had been killed tried to drag off the body. One seized his weapon of green talc; and the other tried to secure the hanger, which Mr Monkhouse had but just time to prevent. As the whole body were now returning with threatening gestures, those who had their guns loaded with small shot fired. The effect was to make the natives turn back, and to retreat up the country, several of them being wounded. Such was the first unhappy attempt of the English to open up an intercourse with the inhabitants of New Zealand, for that was the magnificent country Captain Cook and his companions had now reached. Painful as it is to reflect on the sacrifice of human life which often in those days attended the first intercourse of civilised Europeans with the savage inhabitants of newly-discovered countries, and the cruelties and injuries inflicted, we must not judge our countrymen too harshly. Much less value was set on human life a century ago than is the case at present, and dark-skinned savages were scarcely regarded as beings of the same nature as white men. Captain Cook was, however, undoubtedly a kind and humane man, and was sincere in his expressions of regret at the blood his followers so frequently shed whenever they met with opposition from the natives of the lands they visited.

Having no longer any hope of establishing a friendly intercourse with the inhabitants of this place, and finding that the water in the river was salt, Captain Cook proceeded with the boats round the head of the bay, in search of fresh water, intending also, if possible, to surprise some of the natives, and, by kind treatment and presents, to obtain their friendship. Everywhere, however, a dangerous surf beat on the coast, and he was unable to land. But seeing two canoes coming in towards the shore, one under sail, and the other moved by paddles, he judged it necessary for the object he had in view to intercept them. Supposing that they were fishermen without arms, he hoped to do this without bloodshed. Notwithstanding the way in which he had placed the boats, one of the canoes managed to escape; but the other, under sail, came directly into the middle of the English boats without perceiving what they were. On discovering the strangers, the natives lowered their sail and took to their paddles. Tupia called out to them that those in the boats wished to be friends; but the natives preferred trusting to their paddles, and continued their flight. On this, a musket was fired over their heads, when they ceased paddling and began to strip, not to swim to the shore but to fight to the last.

When the boat came up they attacked the English with paddles, stones, and other weapons, and showed a determination not to be taken alive. The English, in their own defence, fired, when four out of the seven people in the canoe were killed. The other three were lads—the eldest of whom, about nineteen years old, leaped into the sea, swimming vigorously, and resisting every effort made to capture him. At last he was seized and taken into the boat, as were the two younger lads, without further attempt to escape. As soon as they were in the boat, the lads squatted down, evidently expecting instant death. Every effort was made to win their confidence, and with so much success that by the time the ship was reached they appeared not only reconciled to their fate, but in high spirits. On food being offered them, they ate it voraciously, and asked and answered questions with every appearance of pleasure. At night, however, they sighed, and seemed to be mourning for the friends they had lost; but, encouraged by Tupia, they quickly regained their cheerfulness, and in the morning ate another enormous meal. On being told that they would be put on shore where the English had landed the previous day, they expressed great alarm, and said that the inhabitants were their enemies and would eat them. At last, on landing on the other side of the bay, after hesitating for some time, the lads cried out that they saw, among a large body of natives who were approaching, one of their relations. Still they seemed doubtful about joining them, and evidently regretted leaving their new friends. The body of the native who had been killed the previous day still lay on the shore. The boys, seeing it, went and covered it with some of the clothes they had received on board the Endeavour. Soon after, a man, who proved to be the uncle of one of the boys, swam over with a green bough in his hand, which was here, as at Otaheite, an emblem of peace. Tupia received the branch, and several presents were made to the native. Notwithstanding this, he refused to go on board the strange ship. Breaking off another bough, he then approached the dead body, before which he performed numerous ceremonies. When this was done he returned to his companions, and held with them a long consultation. The boys refused to go back to their countrymen, and begged again to be taken on board. The natives, after this, were observed from the ship to cross the river, and to carry off the dead body on a kind of bier.

Later in the day, the captain directed Tupia to ask the boys if they had any longer a fear of landing, the body having been carried off, which was supposed to be a ratification of peace. They replied that they were perfectly ready to go, and stepped with alacrity into the boat which was prepared to carry them on shore.

On the boat reaching the shore they landed willingly, but soon after, when she put off, waded back into the water, and entreated to be taken on board. As the midshipman in charge of the boat had received strict orders not to receive them, their request was not granted. After a time a man came and took them across the river, on a raft, to where a large number of people were assembled. They appeared to be well received, and shortly after were seen standing on the beach, when they waved their hands three times and stepped nimbly back to their companions.

Captain Cook gave the name of Poverty Bay to the place where these events occurred; and in his journal he strongly expresses his regret at the destruction of the four unfortunate fishermen, saying that, had he supposed they would have resisted, he would not have attempted to stop them; but that, as it was, he could not allow his people to be knocked on the head by the savages. It may be asked, why were the savages not permitted to escape? The reply of Captain Cook is, that he considered it his duty, in prosecution of his enterprise, to open a communication with the natives by force if he could not succeed by gentle means. In pursuance of that object, and in accordance with this supposed duty, our countrymen had little scruple in shedding the blood and taking the lives of their fellow-men, even when violence was not necessary for their own safety.

The next morning the Endeavour sailed from Poverty Bay, but, being becalmed, several canoes came off to her. The natives in one canoe setting the example, the rest were easily persuaded to come on board, to the number of fifty men. Only two weapons were seen among them; these were made of green talc, and called patoo-patoo, being shaped somewhat like a pointed battledore, with a short handle and sharp edges. They were well contrived for close fighting, and would certainly split the thickest skull at a single blow. The sad truth of this some of our countrymen were afterwards to experience, when not far from this spot the greater part of a ship’s company were destroyed, each savage producing one of these weapons from under his cloak, and singling out a victim for instant destruction. Presents were made by the officers of the Endeavour to the natives, who were all so eager for the white men’s goods that they afterwards exchanged everything they had with them, even to the paddles of their canoes. Inquiries were made for the poor boys, and the captain was assured that no harm had happened to them, and that it was in consequence of the account they had given of their reception on board that the present party had come off to the ship.

An hour before sunset the natives paddled off, leaving three of their number below. As soon as this was discovered they were hailed, but would not return, nor did the deserted natives seem to be alarmed. The next morning, however, when they discovered that the ship was at a distance from the land, their consternation was excessive, and Tupia had great difficulty in pacifying them. On standing in again, a canoe with an old chief came off, but he and his followers would not venture on board till Tupia had used numerous arguments to persuade them—among others, an assurance that the strangers did not eat men. This remark, coupled with those of the boys, gave the English their first suspicions of the horrible propensity of the people with whom they were now attempting to open up an intercourse. The old chief, after remaining a short time on board, returned with the three men to the shore.

The point of land first made to the north of Poverty Bay proved to be the most eastern part of New Zealand, and was called East Cape. The Endeavour was now steered to the south. An island close to the main was passed, which, from its similarity to Portland in Dorsetshire, received the same name. A number of natives were here seen seated on the cliffs watching the ship’s movements. When she suddenly got close to a reef, and there was some sign of confusion on board, they showed a disposition to attack her. Canoes at different times came off, and in one the people performed certain ceremonies, sometimes offering peace, and then threatening war. Five large canoes full of armed men soon after came off. As the boat’s crew were sounding, it was necessary to drive them away. A musket fired over their heads had no effect, but a four-pounder charged with grape shot, though fired wide, put them to flight.

Farther along the coast, the next morning, nine or ten large canoes, which must have contained little short of two hundred men, came off. When the first five were within a hundred yards of the ship, the natives began to sing their war-songs and to brandish their weapons. Tupia, on this, was ordered to inform them of the power and effects of the English thunder-making arms, and a four-pounder loaded with grape was fired wide of them. The result was satisfactory, and the natives went peaceably away. The following day another fleet of canoes came alongside, and though they had only stale fish to sell, Captain Cook accepted it for the sake of encouraging traffic. The natives, however, showed every disposition to take advantage of the strangers, and one of them having agreed to exchange a black cloak for a piece of red cloth, on receiving the cloth, packed it in a basket with the cloak, which he refused to give up, and made off with both cloth and cloak. Among those who were leaning over the ship’s side to hand up the articles purchased from the natives was Tupia’s boy, Tayeto. One of the natives, watching his opportunity, suddenly seized the boy, and dragging him over, held him down in the canoe, which made off. The marines on deck were ordered to fire, and to aim at the end of the canoe farthest away from the boy. One of the natives was seen to fall, when the other let go his hold of Tayeto, who leaped overboard and swam to the ship. A boat was lowered, and he was taken up unhurt, but dreadfully frightened. The canoes made towards the shore, and it was observed that three men were lifted out of them, either killed or badly wounded.

In this instance the natives actually deserved the punishment they received. Captain Cook called the headland off which this circumstance occurred Cape Kidnappers. When Tayeto recovered from his fright he took a fish to Tupia, that he might offer it to his Etua. Tupia praised him, and ordered him to throw it into the sea.

Captain Cook having now stood to the southward for a considerable distance without finding a harbour, tacked and stood to the northward, in hope of being more successful in that direction. The ship was off a high bluff headland with yellowish cliffs, which was accordingly called Cape Turnagain. Soon afterwards two chiefs and their three attendants paddled off, and willingly came on board. One of the chiefs had a very pleasing and honest expression of countenance. Though they would not eat, they seemed disposed to be very friendly, so much so that they insisted on remaining on board all night. The next morning they were somewhat surprised at finding themselves so far from the shore, but went away without hesitation. As the ship sailed along, several canoes came off to her, a few at a time. In one were two old chiefs, who, with many expressions of goodwill, invited the strangers on shore. The surf prevented their going, but in the evening, the wind moderating, Captain Cook, with Mr Banks and Dr Solander, landed, and were received in a most friendly manner. The natives took care not to appear in large bodies, the members of two or three families only keeping together. These little companies sat on the ground, and by signs invited their visitors to draw near. These indications of a friendly disposition determined the commander to fill his casks with water at this place.

The next morning, while this operation was going forward, Mr Banks and Dr Solander walked along the shore of the bay by themselves without anxiety, and collected numerous plants. They visited several huts, and found the inhabitants at dinner, their food consisting, at this time of the year, of fish and the root of a large fern. The roots were prepared by scorching them over a fire, and then beating them till the charred bark fell off. The remainder was a clammy, soft substance, not unpleasant to the taste, but mixed with three times its bulk of fibres, which could not be swallowed. This part was spat out into baskets ready at hand for its reception. No animals were seen, except some ugly little dogs. Carefully cultivated and closely fenced plantations of sweet potatoes and other vegetables were seen. The women were plain, and had their faces painted with red ochre and oil; the men generally did not follow the latter custom, but one man was observed who had a piece of yellow ochre in his hand, with which he renewed the coloured decorations on his person whenever he supposed them to be deficient. Mr Banks and others, having remained on shore after the boats had gone off with the casks, were brought on board by the natives in one of their canoes. Indeed, all the intercourse with the people in this place was carried on in the most friendly manner.

At the watering-place the natives entertained their visitors with a war-song, in which the women joined, with horrid distortions of countenance, rolling their eyes, thrusting out their tongues and heaving deep sighs, all keeping perfect time. A canoe was seen here, sixty-eight feet and a half long, five broad, and three feet and a half deep; she had a sharp bottom, consisting of three trunks of trees hollowed; the side planks were sixty-two feet long in one piece, carved in bas-relief; the head being still more richly carved. A large unfinished house was also visited; the side ports were carved in a masterly style, though with whimsical taste. The bay was called by the natives Tolaga.

Wood and water, and an abundance of wild celery, which proved an excellent anti-scorbutic, having been got on board, the Endeavour weighed and stood to the north. The wood they had cut was like the English maple; and a cabbage-tree was met with and cut down for the sake of the cabbage, or the succulent soft stem, so-called by the voyagers from its taste when boiled. The country abounded with plants, and the woods with birds in an endless variety, and exquisitely beautiful. After rounding each cape, numerous villages were seen, and much cultivated ground. Some way on an immense canoe with sixteen paddles on each side, and carrying sixty armed men, gave chase to the ship. To prevent an attack, a round shot was fired near them, when they paddled off; the headland near at hand was therefore called Cape Runaway. After this, a large number of canoes came off to trade; but the natives were disposed to cheat. At length some linen hanging over the bows to dry was carried off by a man, who, though fired at, deliberately packed it up and made off with it. As the natives continued to insult the English, a shot was fired close to them, which went bounding over the water far ahead, and made them paddle away at great speed.

Several villages were seen larger than any before observed, built on eminences near the sea, and fortified on the land side by a bank and ditch, with a high paling within it, carried all round; some of them had also outworks. They were supposed to be the fortified villages called by the natives Pahs or Hippahs. There seems to have been much doubt in the minds of the officers of the Endeavour as to whether the land on which they were now coasting was an island or part of a vast continent. The captain seems to have held to the former opinion, his officers to the latter.

The ship was now near a cluster of islands to which the names of the Mayor and the Court of Aldermen were given. Farther on more villages were in sight, with some hundreds of large canoes drawn up on the beach under them. The whole country from Cape Turnagain, thus far, was said to be under the rule of a single chief, called Teratu. A large inlet was next entered, and here the ship anchored. Several canoes of a less ornamental description came alongside, and tried to steal the buoy of the anchor. Three times during the night they repeated the attempt, hoping, it seemed, to catch the crew asleep. Again they came at daylight, and sang a war-song, preparatory to an attack. Tupia, however, expostulated with them, and explained so successfully that they would certainly be the sufferers in case of a skirmish, that instead of fighting, they began to trade. Here, again, a native made off with two pieces of cloth, both of which he had got for one weapon, which he refused to deliver up. A musket-ball was fired through his canoe; but he would not return. It was curious that the people in the other canoes paid no attention to him, though he was bleeding, but continued to trade as if nothing had happened. Soon afterwards, indeed, the same trick was played by others. Two muskets were fired, the bullets going through the sides of the canoe between wind and water. This only made the savages pull off more rapidly. As the commander intended to remain in this place for some days, to observe the transit of Mercury, it was necessary to make the natives understand the superiority of the English; and a round shot was therefore fired over their heads.

All the natives, however, were not alike dishonest. One chief, in particular, had behaved with great propriety during the day, neither attempting to cheat nor showing any fear of the English. He came off the next morning, and soon established friendly relations with them. He said that the people were generally convinced of their power, and would, he hoped, behave properly in future. His name was Toiava.

An officer, with the marines and a party of men, was sent on shore to cut wood. No houses were seen; but there were a number of people, who seemed to have slept under the bushes. The state of warfare in which the people existed was shown by Toiava when on board one day. Two canoes were perceived coming in from the opposite side of the bay, when, saying that they were enemies, he hastened off to the shore with all his canoes. He soon returned, however, they not being the people he supposed. A large number of mackerel were obtained here from the natives, the sailors salting enough to last for a month.

Fortunately, a fine day enabled the commander and Mr Green to obtain a satisfactory observation of Mercury; and the name of Mercury Bay was, therefore, given to the harbour on the shore of which it was taken. While they were on shore another case, of cheating by a native occurred. The thief and his companions having pulled off in their canoe, sang their war-song, and shook their paddles in defiance. This so provoked Mr Gore, the officer in charge, that he fired and killed the man, a circumstance for which Captain Cook expressed his deep regret. Though at first alarmed, the natives on shore, on inquiring into the matter, seemed to think that the man had received his deserts, and the friendly intercourse begun between them and the English was not further interrupted.

A little before sunset, the natives retired to eat their supper, consisting of birds, fish, and lobsters. Some were roasted, stuck on sticks inclined towards the fire; others were baked in ovens on the ground, in the way practised by the people of Otaheite. Among the natives was a woman mourning for the death of a relative. She sat on the ground by herself, and cut herself all over with pieces of shell till she was covered with blood, singing in a mournful voice, at the same time, a song the meaning of which Tupia could not understand.

The shore abounded with clams, cockles, and, in some places, rock-oysters. Numerous wild-fowl also were seen, and several were shot. The boats rowed up a river at the head of the bay for four or five miles, and near it a deserted fort of considerable strength was visited. Several beds of oysters were also discovered, dry at half-ebb, and a boat being sent to fetch some, returned completely laden, so that the ship’s company had a regular feast of them. Fish, also in abundance, were brought off by the natives. On the north side of the bay, a pah, small, but very strong and beautifully situated, was visited. It stood on the top of a rock detached from the mainland, surrounded at high-water. The centre part was perforated by an arch sixty feet in height, and of considerable width. The only way of reaching the top was by a very narrow winding path. Here there was room only for four or five huts. Farther on was a much larger fortified village, the inhabitants of which, to the number of a hundred, came out and invited the strangers to visit them, and seemed highly pleased when their invitation was accepted.

This pah, or fort, was examined with much interest, and afterwards minutely described by the English visitors. It seemed, indeed, a place which, if resolutely defended, was capable of holding out against any number of assailants famished only with such arms as were seen in the hands of the natives. It was curious that men capable of constructing so elaborate a fortification should have invented simply such weapons as lances, small and large battle-axes, and clubs; for not a sling nor a bow was seen among them, nor any other weapon but those mentioned. When stones were used they were thrown by the hand.

The Endeavour, having taken an ample supply of celery on board, sailed from Mercury Bay. The most successful generals of ancient and modern times were able to take advantage of their greatest victories by having paid careful attention to their commissariat; and Cook, for the same reason, could prolong his researches for a greater length of time than any previous navigator, and keep his crew in tolerable health, more especially preserve them from that fearful scourge of seamen, the scurvy. Of course he was greatly indebted to the experienced botanists on board, who were able to discover any anti-scorbutic plants grown on the shores they visited. Probably the lives of thousands of seamen might have been saved had the commanders been acquainted with the wild plants that the loving God has everywhere provided for the use of His creatures, capable of preventing that dire complaint.

About fifty miles to the north of Mercury Bay, the natives came off and threw stones at the ship, nor would they listen to the expostulations and advice of Tupia, till a musket-ball was sent through the bottom of one of their canoes, when they were convinced of the truth of his account respecting the power of the strangers.

On the 19th a large inlet was entered, in which the ship brought up. Immediately natives came off, who said that they had heard of the strangers from Toiava. One young man introduced himself as his grandson, and received several presents. They also addressed Tupia by name, showing that they had heard of the English from their friends. The commander and his usual companions proceeded in the boats nine miles up the inlet, which they discovered terminated in a river. This they entered with the flood, and found fresh water three miles from the mouth. Here they saw a large village on a sand-bank entirely surrounded by mud, probably considered a sufficient protection from their enemies. They were particularly struck by the great size of the pine trees which grew on the banks. One measured nineteen feet eight inches in girth at the height of six feet from the ground. From the root to the first branch it was eighty-nine feet, and as straight as an arrow, tapering very little in proportion to its height. It probably contained, by the captain’s computation, three hundred and sixty-six cubic feet of solid timber. Others still larger were seen. A small one was cut down, and found to be similar to the pitch pine, too heavy for masts, but the carpenter was of opinion that, by tapping, the wood would be lightened, and that then the trees would make the finest masts in the world. These trees were the celebrated Kauri pine, from which a valuable gum is extracted. It also makes very fine planking. This tree, the flax plant, and the gigantic fern are among the characteristic productions of New Zealand.

The name of the Thames was given to the river explored. The natives in the neighbourhood behaved in the most friendly manner; but while the commander and Dr Solander were on shore, and Mr Banks with Tupia and some of the natives were below, a lad took possession of a half-minute glass from the binnacle. Mr Hicks, who was commanding officer, ordered the lad to be triced up and a dozen lashes given to him. His countrymen interfered, and called for their arms from the canoes alongside. In vain Mr Banks, hearing the noise, and coming on deck, expostulated with the lieutenant. Tupia at length pacified the natives by explaining what was to happen, and allowed the punishment to proceed. As soon as it was over, an old man, supposed to be the father of the boy, gave him a beating and sent him into the canoe; but the confidence of the natives was gone, and though they promised to come back, no more was seen of them.

The natives on most occasions were ready to steal and cheat, whenever they thought they could do so with impunity. This occurred nearly every day as the Endeavour proceeded along the coast. In one day, at different times, nearly five hundred natives were on board or alongside, showing that the country was very populous. One of these was making off with an article of which he had possessed himself without giving anything in return, when the midshipman to whom it belonged hove a lead with a hook secured to it at the end of a line, with such aim that the hook caught the thief, but broke off. While at anchor in another part of this bay, which is known as the Bay of Islands, the commander gave a piece of cloth to an old chief, one of several hundred natives crowding round the ship. Notwithstanding this, some of them tried to steal the buoy, and not till one of them was hit by a musket-ball would they give it up. After this, the commander, with Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and two boats’ crews, landed in a little cove. They had not been there long, before they saw nearly three hundred people rushing towards them from behind the heads of the cove, and over the top of the hill. Some of the savages rushed to the boats to seize them, and others, led by a chief, advanced towards the English. The commander, Mr Banks, and two of the man fired with small shot. The natives, though at first they fell back, soon again rallied and advanced. On this Dr Solander fired again, and hit the chief, who, with the rest, ran off. The natives still continued in a body, and, as seen from the ship, appeared very numerous. A few round shot fired over their heads dispersed them. Happily not a single life was lost, and only two men were slightly wounded. As it happened, the old chief to whom the cloth had been given in the morning had, with some of his family, concealed himself in a cave. While the party were collecting celery he was discovered, and was soon put at his ease. He said that one of the men who had been hit with small shot was his brother, and inquired anxiously whether he would die. He was assured that he would not; and a bullet and small shot being shown to him, he was told that those who were hit with the first would die, but that the wounds made by the last were seldom mortal. He and his companions now came and sat down by the English, who gave them a few trifles.

Several days were passed in the Bay of Islands, and a friendly intercourse was maintained during the remainder of the time with the natives. On going out of it the ship grazed a rock to windward of her with great violence, but received no injury. This part of the country was evidently very densely inhabited; and the people seemed to live on friendly terms with each other, though no head or leading chief was heard of. Fishing seemed to be one of their principal occupations, and nets of great length were seen—one of not less than from three to four hundred fathoms. Their towns were all fortified. Farther on, while becalmed, some people who came off told the voyagers that at the distance of three days’ rowing the land would take a sharp turn to the south, and extend no more to the west. It was conjectured, therefore, that this headland was one seen by Tasman, and called by him Cape Maria Van Diemen; and an eager lookout was kept for the important headland.

At six in the morning on December 16 land was seen from the mast-head, which proved to be North Cape. It lies in latitude 34 degrees 22 minutes South, and longitude 186 degrees 55 minutes West. The isthmus which joins this head to the mainland is low, which gives it the appearance of an island. On the cape a hippah, or village, was seen, with several inhabitants. Soon after this, when off Cape Maria Van Diemen, the Endeavour met with a gale which, though it was in the middle of the summer of that hemisphere, Captain Cook says, for its strength, and the length of time it lasted, was such as he had scarcely ever been in before. The ship was three weeks getting ten leagues to the westward, and five weeks in getting fifty leagues. During the gale the ship was a considerable distance from the land, or it is highly probable, he says, they would not have returned to relate their adventures.

It is not necessary to mention the various courses run for several days, as no communication was held with the shore. At length a lofty peak was seen towering above the clouds, and covered with snow, to which the name of Mount Egmont was given. It was surrounded by a flat country of a pleasant appearance, being clothed with verdure and wood. Near it a bay was entered, in a safe and convenient cove of which the ship anchored. Some canoes at once paddled off, and much against the wishes of his people, an old chief from one of them came on board. He was received with all possible friendship, and after some time was dismissed, with many expressions of kindness, to his companions. This treatment had a beneficial effect, though some of the natives showed an inclination to try how far they might go with the strangers. On one occasion they pursued the long-boat as it was going on shore with casks; but some small shot quickly made them desist.

The bay where they were at anchor was found to be about fifteen miles south of one visited by Tasman, though none of the people among whom Tupia made inquiries had any tradition of his having been on the coast. The commander, with Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and others, on their way one day to visit a cove two miles off, saw the body of a woman floating, having apparently been dead for some days. Immediately on landing they found a family who seemed greatly alarmed at their approach, and ran away. In a short time, however, they were induced to return, and confidence being established, became very communicative. The body of the woman was that of a relation whom they had buried at sea fastened to a stone, from which they supposed it had broken. The family were dressing some provisions, and as the gentlemen cast their eyes into one of the baskets which stood near, two bones were perceived, which, upon nearer examination, were found to be those of a human body. The natives, on being questioned by Tupia, acknowledged, without the slightest hesitation, that they were the bones of a man whom they had eaten; that a canoe belonging to their enemies had come into the bay five days before; that seven persons in her had been killed, and that this man was one of them. On Tupia asking why they did not eat the body of the woman, they replied that she was a relation, and that they only eat the bodies of their enemies killed in battle. One of the natives took hold of his own forearm, and intimated that the bone Mr Banks held in his hand had belonged to that part of the human body; he also bit and gnawed the bone which Mr Banks had taken, drawing it through his mouth, and showing by signs that it had afforded a delicious repast. A woman of this family of cannibals had her arms, legs, and thighs frightfully cut, in token of her grief for the loss of her husband, who had lately been killed and eaten by their enemies.

Mr Banks and Dr Solander were several times on shore, but their walks were much circumscribed by climbing plants of luxuriant growth, which completely filled up the spaces between the trees, so as to render the woods impassable. Preparations had been made for erecting a durable memorial of the Endeavour’s visit, and their old friend promised that it should never be removed. Presents of coins and spike-nails, with the king’s broad arrow on them, were given to the natives, and two posts, of which the memorial was to be constructed, were taken to the highest part of the island near which the ship lay. The Union-Jack was then hoisted, and formal possession was taken of the country in the name of His Majesty King George the Third; the name of Queen Charlotte’s Sound being given to the inlet. A bottle of wine was then drunk to Her Majesty’s health, and the empty bottle given to the old man, who seemed highly delighted with it.

The Endeavour left the sound on February 6, and soon after, during a calm, was very nearly driven on shore by the strong current setting through the straits between the northern and middle island, now known as Cook’s Straits. Over the land was seen a mountain of stupendous height, covered with snow. Passing through the straits, the Endeavour steered north again, and continued on till, the weather clearing, Cape Turnagain was distinctly seen. Captain Cook on this asked his officers whether they were satisfied that Eaheinomauwe was an island. They replying in the affirmative, the Endeavour hauled her wind and stood to the eastward. Eaheinoniauwe was the name given by the natives to the northern island, Poenammoo to the southern, or rather, as it is now called, the middle island.

The Endeavour was now steered down the eastern coast of the last-named portion of New Zealand. Some lofty mountains were seen, partially covered with snow, and inferior in height to Mount Egmont. During a calm, when close in shore, Mr Banks went out in a small boat for the purpose of shooting. While he was away four double canoes were seen to put off from the shore, and to pull towards him. Captain Cook trembled for his friend’s safety, for Mr Banks could not see the signals made to hasten his return. At length he noticed the natives, and his boat’s head was turned towards the ship. The natives also approached. He, however, got on board before them, thankful for his escape. Probably, indeed, their attention had been so engrossed with the ship that they had not seen him. When they came about a stone’s throw off, they stopped and gazed at the ship with vacant astonishment; but even Tupia’s eloquence could not induce them to come on board. After surveying the ship, they made towards the shore, but it was dark before they could have reached it. This was the only sight Captain Cook had of the inhabitants of the middle island, or Tovy Poenammoo.

An island about twenty-four leagues in circumference, and five leagues from the main, was discovered, to which the name of Banks’s Island was given. Some persons on board asserting that they saw land to the south-east, the commander, though believing that they were mistaken, steered in that direction; but no land being discovered, the ship wore, and was steered east-south-east. Tovy Poenammoo was found to be very much larger than Captain Cook expected to find it, from the description of the natives in Queen Charlotte’s Sound. Heavy gales and rough seas were encountered, and on one occasion, at dawn, rocks were seen close under the ship’s bows, she having in the night passed close to another dangerous reef, some leagues from the main. The land discovered appeared green and well wooded, but destitute of inhabitants. Several whales and seals were observed, whereas none had been seen off the north island. At length, on March 5, the South Cape was rounded. At the time Captain Cook was doubtful whether it was part of the large island or a separate island, though he marked it in his chart as the former. Nothing of importance occurred during the passage back to the entrance of Cook’s Straits, on the northern shore of which, in a bay called Admiralty, the Endeavour again anchored, that she might fill up with wood and water. This was accomplished by March 31, 1770, when a course was shaped by which it was hoped the eastern coast of New Holland would be reached. It was intended, after visiting that coast, to return home by the East Indies and the Cape of Good Hope. Captain Cook himself had wished to return by Cape Horn, with the view of settling the question of a great southern continent; but the ship was deemed unfit to brave the tempests to be expected in a high southern latitude in the most inclement season of the year. The name of Cape Farewell was given to the last point of land seen as the Endeavour quitted the coast of New Zealand. The manners and customs of the inhabitants, as well as the features of New Zealand, are now almost as well-known as those of any country in Europe, and we are able to judge of the extraordinary accuracy of all Captain Cook’s descriptions whenever he had an opportunity of observing them.

Cape Farewell was left on March 31, and the Endeavour sailed westward. Nine days afterwards a tropical bird was seen, and on the 15th the voyagers caught sight of an egg-bird and a gannet; and as these birds never fly far from land, the lead was constantly heaved through the night. No bottom, however, was found; and it was not till six o’clock on the morning of April 19 that land was seen by Mr Hicks, the first lieutenant. This land proved to be part of the vast country of New Holland, since better known as Australia. The coast first seen was that of New South Wales.

The Endeavour now coasted along about three leagues from the shore, and as the weather was clear, a pleasant landscape presented itself before the eyes of the explorers. The land was of moderate elevation, diversified by hills and valleys, ridges and plains. Here and there were open spaces clothed with verdure, but in general the country was covered with timber. Smoke was in several places seen, showing that the country was inhabited.

Several days were spent—the Endeavour coasting along the shore to the northward; but on account of a northerly wind the voyagers were seldom near enough to remark the features of the country. At last a bay was discovered which seemed to be well sheltered from all winds, and Captain Cook determined to anchor in it. Just before this several natives had been seen on the shore, four of them carrying a canoe, but they did not come off, and when the yawl, in which the commander attempted to land, approached, they all ran away. So heavy a surf broke on the beach that it was found impossible to go ashore.

The pinnace was now sent ahead with the master to sound, while, the wind being out, the ship beat into the bay. A smoke being seen on shore, the glasses were directed towards it, when ten men were observed sitting round a fire, which they presently left, and then ascended a slight eminence, whence they could observe the proceedings of the English visitors. As the pinnace pulled along the shore most of the natives kept abreast of her. Some of them used threatening gestures, brandishing their weapons: there were two especially, whose faces seemed to have been dusted with a white powder, and their bodies painted with broad streaks, also white, which, passing obliquely over their breasts and backs, looked not unlike the cross-belts worn by soldiers. The same kind of streaks were also drawn round their legs and thighs, like broad garters. They were armed with long spears, and each of these men held in his hand a weapon curved like a scimitar, and which appeared to be about two feet and a half long. The Endeavour anchored two miles within the bay, in six-fathom water, abreast of a small village consisting of six or eight huts. On the two points on either side of the entrance a few huts, and men, women, and children, were seen, as were four small canoes, with a man in each engaged in fishing, so intent on their occupation that they took no notice of the ship. An old woman also, followed by three children, came out of a thicket, laden with fire-wood, each of the children having its burden. When she reached the huts three more children came out to meet her. She looked often at the ship, but manifested no surprise, and went on with her occupation and kindled a fire. Presently the men landed, hauled up their canoes, and began to dress the fish, apparently unconcerned at the stranger ship within half a mile of them. None of the savages had on a particle of clothing. It was a curious scene, like that of a drama in which the actors take no notice of the spectators.

In this instance, however, the actors were not so indifferent as they at first appeared; for when Captain Cook and several companions approached the shore in one of the boats, although the greater number of the people ran away, two men armed with lances came down on the rocks to dispute the landing of the strangers. (Note 2.) It was not an inapt representation on a small scale of the contest which, ere many years had rolled by, was to begin on these shores between savagedom and civilisation, when the latter would, with giant strides, sweep over and subdue the land. The two brave savages kept flourishing their lances and shouting in discordant tones, and Captain Cook, unwilling to injure them, ordered his crew to lie on their oars while he tried to parley with them. To show also his goodwill, he threw them nails, beads, and other trifles, which they took up and seemed pleased to obtain. They then waved their hands and seemed to invite their visitors on shore, but as soon as the boat approached they hurried again to oppose a landing. Captain Cook, as a last resource, fired a musket between them. On hearing the report the youngest dropped a bundle of lances, but quickly picked them up; while the eldest, as if in defiance, threw a stone at the intruders. Upon this a musket with small shot was fired at his legs, on which he scampered off to the huts. It was hoped that the contest was now over, and accordingly the English stepped on the shore of that vast territory which was to become the heritage of millions of the Anglo-Saxon race. Still the savage was not subdued, and appeared once more with a shield on his arm, and

advancing, made one more significant protest against the intrusion of the white man, by hurling a spear into the very midst of the strangers. Happily, no one was hurt, and a third musket loaded with small shot being fired at them, after another spear had been thrown by one of the brave natives, they both took to flight, and the English claimed to be, by right of conquest, the lords of the soil. They might have pursued and overtaken the savages, but Mr Banks suggested that the spears were possibly poisoned, and that it would be imprudent to venture into the woods.

On entering one of the huts some little children were seen partially concealed, but they were not disturbed, and when the English went away, some beads, ribbons, and pieces of cloth were left in the huts as presents, which it was hoped would gain the goodwill of the natives. Fifty spears, from six to fifteen feet long, found lying about, were carried off. It was at first supposed that they were poisoned, but on further examination it was found that they were used for spearing fish, and that the green substance found sticking to them was seaweed.

The next morning a stream was found at which the casks could be filled. While this operation was going on, the natives came down and watched the proceedings with wonder, but did not venture to approach the strangers, though Mr Hicks advanced towards them with presents in his hands, making every sign of friendship he could think of. That the bay was full of fish, and capable of giving food to a large population, Captain Cook had ample proof; for going with Mr Banks and Dr Solander to a cove on the north side of the bay, in three or four hauls with the seine they took above three hundredweight of fish.

An expedition into the country was planned the same day by the commander, Mr Banks, Dr Solander, and seven others, and from it a very fair idea of the general face of the country was obtained. On visiting the huts they found that the natives had not taken away the presents that had been left for them; and others, therefore, of greater value, were added. Presents were left also at all the huts which were passed, in the hope of thus gaining the goodwill of the natives. The trees were tall, straight, and without underwood, and at such a distance from each other that the land might be cultivated without cutting down a tree. The ground was covered with an abundance of grass, growing in tufts close together, about as large as could well be grasped in the hand. Although numerous huts were seen, the natives kept themselves carefully concealed, though probably watching the strangers at a distance; a glimpse only was caught of one man, who instantly ran away. A transient view was got of an animal as big as a rabbit, and of the tracks of another of the size of a wolf, clawed like a dog; traces of a third, which fed on grass, and judged to be not less than a deer in size, were also seen. The trees overhead abounded with birds of various kinds, among which were many of exquisite beauty, particularly loriquets and cockatoos, which flew in scores together. The trees, however, were not of many species; among others was one which yielded a gum not unlike the sanguis draconis.

Many other excursions were made on shore, especially by Mr Banks and Dr Solander, in search of plants, of which they found vast quantities; and from this circumstance Captain Cook gave the place the name of Botany Bay, a name the whole country commonly bore for more than half a century afterwards.

Every effort to establish a friendly intercourse with the natives failed. They had undoubtedly watched, though unperceived, the effect of the white men’s weapons, and from awe and terror kept at a distance; still, when they had an opportunity, they showed their hostility to the strangers, and Mr Monkhouse narrowly escaped a spear thrown at him while he was wandering in the woods.

During the ship’s stay in Botany Bay, Captain Cook had the English colours hoisted every day on a flag-staff on shore, and caused the ship’s name, and the date of her visit, to be engraved on a tree near the watering-place.

At daybreak, on Tuesday, May 6, 1770, the Endeavour sailed from Botany Bay, and at noon the same day, in latitude 33 degrees 50 minutes South, she was abreast of a fine-looking harbour, to which Captain Cook gave the name of Port Jackson. Northerly winds prevented the ship from making much progress till, in latitude 32 degrees 40 minutes, another harbour was seen, and called Port Stephens. The ship continued her course to the north; smoke was frequently seen, and occasionally the natives were observed. The land increased considerably in height as she advanced, and in many places exhibited a pleasing variety of ridges, hills, valleys, and plains, all clothed with wood. A wide, open bay was passed in latitude 27 degrees 6 minutes, and called Moreton Bay.

It had now become necessary to lay the ship ashore, and Captain Cook’s object was to find a place where this might be accomplished with safety. Had he entered Port Jackson, he would have found one of the finest harbours in the world for his purpose. He several times anchored while proceeding along the coast, and landed to explore the country—the natives, as before, running off and hiding themselves. Rockingham Bay was passed and named, in latitude 17 degrees 59 minutes. Hitherto the Endeavour had met with no misfortune; but as she was now to make acquaintance with it, the point seen farthest to the north was called Cape Tribulation. It lies in latitude 16 degrees 4 minutes South, and longitude 145 degrees 26 minutes East.

One beautiful moonlight night, as the ship was speeding on her course with a fair wind, among the shoals of that coral sea, and while most of the officers and crew were tranquilly asleep, she suddenly struck upon a reef, and instantly roused every one on board to the horrors of shipwreck on an inhospitable coast, where they might linger for years without succour. However, the captain and his officers and crew were equal to the emergency, and by throwing everything weighty overboard that could be spared, the ship floated, but was making water rapidly. Had the weather been at all stormy, no human power could have saved their vessel. As it was, the fine weather continued long enough to enable them to draw a sail over the leak. This served the purpose of keeping her in sailing trim, until she was safely moored at the mouth of a creek, which was named Endeavour River. This was on June 17, and they remained there repairing the damage to the ship, as well as circumstances permitted, until August 4.

Although the Endeavour was now out of danger, her captain had still abundant cause for anxiety on another account: in spite of all his care, the fearful malady of scurvy had gained, and was still gaining ground among the ship’s company. Poor Tupia, who all his life had been accustomed to fresh fruit and vegetables, was among the chief sufferers, and symptoms were showing themselves which proved that the malignant disease had already made rapid progress. Mr Green, the astronomer, was also, among many others, stricken and disabled. As soon as possible, therefore, a tent was put up on shore for the reception of the sick, and recourse was had to nets, for providing fresh fish for the invalids.

The ground in the immediate neighbourhood of the river was either swampy, sandy, or stony. Mr Banks, who went on shore with his gun, saw great quantities of pigeons and crows: of the former, which were very beautiful, he shot several. He also saw some deserted human habitations, but no natives.

Four guns having been got up from the hold, were mounted on the quarter-deck of the ship, and the heavy stores and powder were landed, that her damages might be examined. It was, indeed, both wonderful and providential that she had escaped destruction; for not only had the sharp rock torn off the planking and worked its way into the timbers, but one point had cut a hole right through the bottom, and, breaking off, had happily remained fixed. Had it fallen out, no human power could have prevented the ship from foundering. Besides the leak, which was on the starboard side, the ship had sustained very extensive injury on the larboard. The sheathing from the bow on that side was torn off, and a great part of the false keel was gone. The carpenters at once commenced their work; and the forge was set up, that the smiths might make bolts and nails.

While this was going on, some of the people were sent on shore to shoot pigeons for the sick, and on their return they reported that they had found a stream of fresh water, and had seen several native huts, and an animal as large as a greyhound, of slender form, mouse-coloured, and very swift. The next day Captain Cook himself saw the same animal; it had a long tail, and leaped liked a hare or deer, and the prints of its feet were like those of a goat. For some time afterwards nothing more was seen of the animal, which Mr Banks, the naturalist, considered must be of some hitherto unknown species; so, indeed, it was, for it had no congeners in any quarter of the globe previously visited; though now the kangaroo is familiar enough to all readers of natural history, and it forms part of the arms of the colony of New South Wales.

Mr Banks likewise captured an Australian opossum, a female, with two young ones. This class of animal was formerly supposed to be peculiar to America, from whence its name is derived. Being nocturnal in their habits, nothing is to be seen of them in the daytime, unless you can catch a glimpse of one at noontide, sleeping soundly in the hollow of a tree. When night comes, they leap from bough to bough with the greatest animation, especially if it be moonlight. Some species, with thin membranes between the fore and hind paws, can take a flying leap of, sometimes, thirty yards from tree to tree; and hence they are called flying squirrels, though perfectly distinct in their nature, and in some of their habits, from that animal.

The carpenters continued to work hard on the ship whenever the tide permitted them. The position in which she was now placed, with her bow on the bank, naturally threw all the water aft, and from this circumstance the world was very nearly losing the results of Mr Banks’s labours. For greater security he had placed his collection of plants in the bread-room, into which the water ran, and covered them completely. By great care most of them were dried, but many were entirely spoilt.

In consequence of the carpenters being able to work only at low tide, the repairs of the ship proceeded very slowly. In the meantime, however, the people benefited from being on shore, and every effort was made to obtain fresh provisions, calculated to improve their health. The commander himself went to superintend the hauling of the seine; but this was attended with little success, for during one evening only between twenty and thirty fish were caught. A root with leaves like spinach, many cabbage-trees, and a wild plantain, were found, with a fruit of a deep purple colour, of the size of a pippin, which improved on keeping; Mr Banks also discovered a plant, called, in the West Indies, Indian kale, which served for greens. These greens, with a large supply of fish afterwards caught, afforded great relief to the voyagers, who had so long been compelled to live on salt meat. Their fresh provisions were further varied by some large cockles, one of which was of such size that it furnished an ample meal for two men. What was of still greater value was the discovery of some fine turtle by the master, three of which he caught when out surveying; though afterwards, when sent out expressly to find more, he seems to have purposely thwarted the wishes of his commander, who, indeed, had too much cause to complain of the narrow-mindedness and ignorance of several of his officers. Many other turtles were, however, afterwards caught, of a species called the green turtle.

Some time elapsed before one of the animals which had been so much the subject of speculation was shot by Mr Gore. This was a young one, but others were seen equal in size to sheep; the larger sort are, indeed, much larger than sheep. The fore legs of this specimen were only eight inches long, and the hind legs two-and-twenty; its mode of progress being by a succession of hops and leaps, helped by its long tail, with which also it balances itself in its progress. It is easy to imagine the interest with which this curious animal, now seen for the first time by civilised men, was examined by Mr Banks and his brother naturalists. The next day their kangaroo (for so the animal was called by the natives) was dressed for dinner, and proved most excellent. The explorers might now have been said to fare sumptuously every day; for they had an abundance of green turtle, fish, and vegetables of different sorts, with an occasional kangaroo. It was indeed fortunate for the crew of the Endeavour that the accident happened to her in this latitude, instead of farther south, where, although the soil amply rewards the labours of men, yet its spontaneous productions are very inferior to those of the north. Kangaroos certainly would have been found in abundance, and perhaps fish, but scarcely any vegetables fit for the food of man.

Favourably, however, as the navigators were situated for diet, their position in other respects was unsatisfactory. This was ascertained by the captain, who, with Mr Banks, one day started on a long walk northward, partly to obtain a view of the country, but chiefly to take note of appearances seaward. After traversing the country about eight miles, they ascended a high hill, and were soon convinced that the danger of their situation was at least equal to their apprehensions; for in whatever direction they turned their eyes, they saw rocks and shoals without number, and no passage out to sea but through the winding channels between them, which could not be navigated without the last degree of difficulty and peril. The reports of the master were equally unsatisfactory with regard to the shoals and dangers off the mouth of the harbour, and it seems surprising that the ship should have escaped them on her passage up the coasts. Still, as she had got in, there was no doubt that she might get out, could the right passage be found. They had other causes for hope and thankfulness: the natives were not likely to prove troublesome, the climate was healthy, and food abundant.

Besides kangaroos, wild dogs were seen, which were supposed to be foxes or wolves, as they partly resembled both these animals. With the natives for some time no intercourse was opened. At last some appeared on the opposite side of the river, very black, totally naked, and with lances in their hands. The commander judiciously ordered his people to take no notice of them, as the best means of drawing them near. This plan succeeded so well that two of them came off in a canoe to within a musket-shot, and talked very loudly. They were answered in the same tone, and by degrees they drew nearer, when some cloth, nails, beads, paper, and other trifles were thrown to them. Of these things, however, they seemed to take no notice, but were highly pleased when a fish was offered them. Some of them afterwards landed where Tupia and the rest of the crew were sitting, and he prevailed on them to lay down their arms, and to come forward without them. He then made signs that they should sit down by him. With this they complied, and seemed to be under no apprehension or constraint, although on more people going on shore they expressed by their gestures some fear lest the newcomers should get between them and their arms. More presents were made to them, to show the goodwill of the strangers, and their desire to continue on friendly terms. To prove this the Englishmen made signs that they were going to dinner, and invited the blacks to eat with them; the latter, however, declined the honour, and went away in their canoes. These men were of the common stature, but their limbs were remarkably small; their hair was black, but not woolly, some of them wearing it short cropped, others lank and long, and others had it curled. Their colour was dark chocolate, but the tint was owing somewhat to the dirt which covered their skins. They had lively eyes, and their teeth were even and white. The tones of their voices were soft and musical, and there was a flexibility in their organs of speech which enabled them to repeat, with great facility, many English words.

The next day three of the same party of natives paid the strangers a visit with a fourth, whom they introduced as Yaparico. This personage was distinguished by having the bone of a bird, six inches long, thrust through the cartilage of his nose. He seemed to prize this strange ornament as much as a young dandy does his newly raised silken moustache. On examination, all his companions were found to have holes in their ears, as he also had, while on the upper part of their arms they wore bracelets of plaited hair; thus evincing a taste for ornament, although they had not a rag of any sort of clothing. The previous day the only gift they seemed to prize was a fish which was offered them. To-day they brought one in return. They were, however, excessively jealous and suspicious, and in consequence of one of the gentlemen examining their canoe, they at once jumped into her and paddled away.

The following day three natives ventured down to Tupia’s tent, and were so well pleased with the way he received them that they went away and brought two others, whom they introduced to him formally by name; a ceremony they never omitted. Some fish were given to them, but after eating a small portion, they threw the rest to Mr Banks’s dog. They could not be persuaded to go far from their canoe, which was about ten feet long, fitted with an outrigger, and though very inferior, like those of the Society Islands. They used paddles, and in shallow water poled it along.

One day, on the commander’s return from an excursion on shore, he found several natives on board. Of all the articles exhibited to them, nothing seemed to have attracted their attention so much as the turtles, of which there were no less than twelve on deck. Two days afterwards they came again, bringing with them a greater number of lances than before. These they placed in a tree, with a man and a boy to watch them. It was evident that their object was to get one of the turtles. They asked for one by signs, and being refused, appealed to everybody who appeared to them to have any authority. Then seizing one, they attempted to drag it overboard. On its being taken from them, they jumped into their canoe in a rage, and went on shore. Here Mr Banks and others followed them. Before they could be stopped they seized their arms, and, snatching a brand from under a pitch-kettle, they whirled it round with great dexterity and rapidity, and set fire to the grass, which was six feet or more high, and dry as stubble. The fire burnt with fearful rapidity. The woodwork of the smith’s forge was destroyed; it caught a sow and some young pigs, one of which was scorched to death, and Mr Banks had great difficulty in saving his tent, which had been set up for Tupia on shore. Happily most of the stores, with the powder, had been taken back to the ship, or the consequences might have been more serious.

In another place the seamen were washing, and a quantity of linen and the nets were spread out to dry. Here the natives, disregarding all threats and entreaties, again set fire to the grass. By great exertions the fire was extinguished before it had done much damage, but where it had first been kindled it burnt with great fury, and spread into the woods to a long distance. A gun loaded with small shot was now fired at the natives, which put them to flight, one of them being wounded; and to give them a lesson, a bullet was fired to pass near them, and this of course hastened their retreat. It was thought that now they would give no more trouble; but in a short time they came back, and Mr Banks and others went out to meet them.

An old man among the natives then advanced, having a lance in his hand without a point. He came forward slowly, stopping several times, and the English made signs to him that they wished to be friends. On this he turned round and addressed his companions, and they, having set up their arms against a tree, also came forward in a friendly manner. The lances which had been taken from them were then returned; this evidently afforded them great satisfaction, and the reconciliation was considered complete.

Several strangers who were among the party were now introduced by name; and on receiving some presents they went away highly contented.

The next day no natives appeared, but the hills all round, for many miles, were on fire, the effects of which by night were very striking. Had the voyagers been compelled by circumstances to remain on that coast, the result of these fires would have been serious, as the conflagration would have driven the kangaroos and the feathered tribes to a distance, and thus deprived the crew of the Endeavour of some of their principal means of support. But the ship was now ready for sea, though the master had been unable to find any channel to the northward by which an escape could be made from among the coral reefs which hemmed her in.

It was necessary, however, to make the attempt without delay, as provisions and stores were running short, and the proper time for navigating the Indian seas was passing by. They were doomed to have their patience yet further tried, for when all was ready heavy gales prevented the ship from putting to sea.

On July 29 the weather moderated, the wind came off the land, and everything appeared favourable for sailing, when it was found that there was not sufficient water on the bar for the ship to pass over it. For several days more the ship was detained by the unfavourable state of the weather: the detention would have been of still greater consequence had not the boats sent out to catch fish and turtle been tolerably successful. At length, on August 4, Captain Cook had the satisfaction of sailing out of Endeavour Harbour. The ship was surrounded by shoals, and he was yet in doubt whether he should beat back to the southward, or seek a passage to the north or east. He had now a most anxious time, for it was clear that there was no way to sea except through the labyrinth of shoals amid which the ship lay. The navigation of a ship among coral rocks is at all times dangerous, for the lead gives no notice of their vicinity, their sides rising up like walls from almost unfathomable depths.

Night now approaching, the Endeavour anchored, when soon afterwards it came on to blow very hard, and at eleven she began to drive. More cable was veered away, and this brought her up; but in the morning, it coming on to blow harder, she drove again. All the appliances of seamanship were put into operation, but still she drove, when topgallant masts were got down, and yards and topmasts struck; and now, at length, she rode securely.

In this position she continued till the 10th, when, Captain Cook having resolved to search for a passage close in shore to the northward, she got under way, and stood in that direction with the boats exploring ahead. Nothing but the greatest caution, perseverance, and first-rate seamanship could have taken the Endeavour free of the dangers which surrounded her. Hour after hour the sagacious commander was at the mast-head, or away in a boat searching for a passage, while the rest of the boats were employed in a similar service. At length a passage was discovered, and with the boats piloting ahead, the Endeavour stood through it.

A long rolling swell convinced the voyagers that they had no rocks or shoals to fear, but at the same time proved to them that they must not place the same confidence in their ship as before she had struck; for the seas she now encountered so widened the leaks that they admitted no less than nine inches of water an hour, which, considering the state of the pumps and the navigation before them, was a matter of serious consideration.

The great object Captain Cook had now in view was to ascertain whether the coast of New Holland, along which he was sailing, was or was not united to that of New Guinea. He was afraid that, if he stood on long to the north, he might overshoot the passage, should one exist. At six in the evening, therefore, he brought the ship to with her head to the north-east, no land being in sight. The next morning sail was made, and land seen; and as the day advanced a reef appeared over which the sea broke heavily, extending from north to south as far as the eye could reach, with an occasional break between the ship and the land. The wind was then east-south-east; but scarcely had the sails been trimmed to haul off it than the wind shifted to east-by-north, which made it very doubtful whether the ship could clear the reef. The lead was kept going all night while the ship stood to the northward, but no bottom was found, yet at four o’clock the roaring of the surf was distinctly heard, and at break of day it was seen foaming to a vast height at not more than a mile off. The seas, too, which rolled in on the reef rapidly carried the ship towards it. The wind fell to a dead calm, and the depth made it impossible to anchor. The only prospect of saving the ship was by rowing; but the pinnace was under repair and useless: the long-boat and yawl were, however, sent ahead to tow, and sweeps were got out.

Still these efforts could only delay the destruction which seemed inevitable. The ship continued to drive on towards the fatal reef; she was within a hundred yards of it, and the same billow which washed her side broke on the reef to a tremendous height the very next time it rose. The carpenters had been working at the pinnace, and she was now lowered, but even with her assistance the Endeavour drove nearer and still nearer to the reef. At the very moment that her doom seemed fixed a light air sprang up, and, with the help of the boats, gave her once more head-way. Scarcely, however, had ten minutes passed before the wind again dropped, and the ship was driven back towards the roaring breakers. Again the gentle breeze returned, and lasted another ten minutes. During this time an opening had been discovered, and the ship was towed towards it, but so strong a current set through it that she was driven fully a quarter of a mile away from the reef. Aided by the boats, the ebb tide carried her nearly two miles away by noon. When the flood made, however, she was once more carried back towards the reef; but in the meantime the first lieutenant had discovered a passage, and a light breeze springing up, it was resolved to attempt it. The boats continued towing ahead; the

raging, roaring sea leaped up on either side; the breeze filled the sails; the tide swept rapidly onward; and in a short time the Endeavour was within the reef, safe from present danger, and anchored in nineteen-fathom water.

Captain Cook now resolved to keep the land close on board, in spite of all dangers, for fear of missing the channel. Numerous islands and headlands were passed and named, and rocks and reefs were escaped, and at length perseverance and sagacity were rewarded by the discovery of York Cape, the northern promontory of the country, and the southern side of Torres Straits, through which the Endeavour triumphantly passed.

As Captain Cook was now about to leave the eastern coast of New Holland, which he had followed up from latitude 38 degrees, and which he was confident no European had ever before seen, he landed on an island, which he named Possession Island, and once more took formal possession of the whole eastern coast of the mainland, in right of His Majesty King George the Third. He gave to the country, with all its bays, rivers, and islands, the name of New South Wales. Three volleys of small arms were then fired, and these were answered by the same number from the ship. Ten natives were seen on the island when this ceremony was performed, and seemed astounded, as they very well might be.

They were seen to be armed with spears; one of them had also a bow and a bundle of arrows, which weapons had not before been seen. Two of them had large ornaments of mother-of-pearl hanging round their necks. It was expected that when the boats approached they would have made a show of opposing a landing, but instead of that, they walked leisurely away. They and their descendants have never been disturbed in their possession of the island, and at the present day it is exactly in the state it was when Cook visited it.

Some time was occupied in the intricate navigation of the straits, and the Endeavour then steered north, along the south-western coast of New Guinea, but the water being shallow, at such a distance from the shore that it could scarcely be seen from the ship. Still, as the commander wished to ascertain the character of the country and the appearance of the inhabitants, he steered in for the land till about three or four miles from it, and in three-fathom water, when the ship came to an anchor on September 3.

The pinnace being hoisted out, Captain Cook, with Mr Banks and his servants, Dr Solander and the boat’s crew, in all twelve persons, well armed, embarked in her and pulled directly for the shore. But the water was so shallow that they could not reach it by about two hundred yards; they therefore waded the rest of the way, and left two seamen to take care of the boat. As yet no inhabitants had been seen, but when the party landed they discovered the print of feet on the sand below high-water mark, showing that people had lately been there. A thick wood came down to within a hundred yards of the water. To avoid the risk of being cut off by an ambush, the explorers proceeded cautiously, skirting the wood till they came to a grove of cocoanut trees of small growth which stood on the bank of a little stream. The trees were well hung with fruit, and near them was a small hut, round which lay a number of the freshly picked shells. Tempting as was the fruit, it was not considered safe to climb the trees to obtain it; they were obliged, therefore, to leave the grove without tasting a nut. Farther on they met with a bread-fruit tree and some plantains, and had got about a quarter of a mile from the boat when three blacks rushed out of the wood with a hideous shout, and ran towards them. The foremost threw something from his hand which burnt like gunpowder, and the other two darted their lances at the strangers. As it was necessary to keep these savages at a distance, they were fired at with small shot, but as this did not make them retreat, and they threw another dart, some bullets were discharged at them. The effect was to make them run; but it was hoped that none of them were wounded. As Captain Cook says, he had no desire to invade the country, either to gratify appetite or curiosity; he judged it right and merciful to retreat at once, so as not to have to destroy more of the ignorant savages. There was no time to lose, as the men in the boat made signs that more natives were collecting. They had succeeded in getting safely on board, when they saw nearly a hundred savages, who shouted and threw fire-darts, several at a time, towards them. On board ship it was supposed, from the effect produced, that the natives had fire-arms, and even from the boat, had they not been so near, the English would have fancied, from the flash and smoke, that the blacks were firing musketry; the sound only was wanting. Some muskets being fired over their heads, they walked leisurely away.

In appearance these natives were very similar to those of New Holland, though their skin was not quite so dark. They were all stark naked. The land was low, and covered with a luxuriance of wood and herbage that can scarcely be conceived. Some of the officers wished to send on shore to cut down the cocoanut trees for the sake of the fruit, but the commander refused to comply with their proposal, feeling that it would be cruel and criminal to risk the lives of the natives, who would certainly try to defend their property, merely for the sake of a transient gratification. The boat was therefore hoisted in, and sail made to the westward.

The more interesting portion of Captain Cook’s first voyage round the world was now accomplished. He had successfully made the important observation for which he was sent out; he had become intimately acquainted with the inhabitants of Otaheite and several of the adjacent islands, though, from the cunning of the people, he had failed to discover that it was among the darkest of “the dark places of the earth.” He had shown that if there was a great southern continent it must be in a very high latitude; he had proved that New Zealand consisted of two great islands, and had cause to suspect the existence of a third smaller one. He had sailed along the coast of New Holland, and had made the acquaintance of its inhabitants and many of its animal and vegetable productions. Though he had seen the coast of Tasmania, and admired its beauty, he had not discovered that it was separated from New Holland; but he had settled the point before in dispute—whether that little-known land was or was not joined to New Guinea—by sailing between them; and he had shown that the eastern coast of the island-continent of Australia was fit to become the habitation of civilised men. This great fact was, after all, the most important result of the voyage.

The condition of the Endeavour had, by this time, become very critical. So battered were her lower timbers and planks, and so out of order were her pumps, that a heavy sea might at any moment have sent her to the bottom. It was absolutely necessary to find a harbour where she might be hove down to undergo a complete refit. Under these circumstances the commander of the expedition determined to go to Batavia, the capital of the Dutch settlements in the island of Java, and at that time the centre of commerce in those seas. He had, indeed, no option, for there was not another port which he could hope to reach, where the ship would receive the necessary repairs. He was not, indeed, ignorant of the unhealthiness of the climate; but he hoped not to be detained there long, and that his hardy crew would be able for a short time to withstand its ill effects.

The first island of any size which the Endeavour sighted after leaving New Guinea was Timor, along the shore of which she coasted. Notwithstanding the wishes of some of his officers, Captain Cook declined to put in there, as he was anxious to reach Batavia without delay. Between that island and Java, however, he fell in with a small island, which at first he thought was a new discovery; but on steering for it, and getting close in with the north side, houses, plantations, and numerous flocks of sheep were seen. The temptation of obtaining fresh meat and vegetables was not to be resisted, as there were many sick on board; and accordingly Mr Gore was sent on shore to open a communication with the natives. Two persons were seen riding on the hills as if for their amusement, and often stopping to look at the ship. This made the voyagers suspect that there must be a settlement of Europeans on the island. Such was in fact the case. The Dutch East India Company had a short time before taken possession of it, and sent a resident to superintend their affairs, though the native rajah or chief was still retained as the nominal ruler of the island. This island proved to be Savu, at that time so little known that it was not to be found on any of the charts on board. It is about thirty miles long, and was then very thickly populated.

In the evening the ship entered a bay before a large native town, over which the Dutch colours were flying, and three guns were fired. The native chief treated the strangers very courteously, and was evidently ready to supply them with all they desired. They were informed that the island abounded in buffaloes, sheep, horses, asses, goats, hogs, dogs, cats, fowls, and pigeons, with most of the fruits of the tropics. The resident, Mr Lange, however, though polite in his manners, very soon showed that he was determined to make a gain of the visitors, and asked the most exorbitant prices for all the provisions they required, besides insisting that they should be paid for in gold. Fortunately, by a well-timed present to an old man, the rajah’s prime minister, his services were engaged, and ultimately, through his means, all the provisions which were required were procured at fair prices. The island was divided into five provinces, with a rajah over each, who could altogether muster upwards of seven thousand fighting men. All the rajahs were said to live on friendly terms with each other, and the inhabitants were described by Mr Lange as being particularly well conducted and moral. Their religion was a kind of paganism, but of a most liberal description, according to the account given by Mr Lange, each man having the liberty to set up a god in his own house, and to worship it after his own fashion. Although, in many instances, the Dutch have been sadly unmindful of the spiritual as well as temporal interests of the inhabitants of their colonial possessions, they had sent to this island a Dutch officer, and a native woman who had been brought up a Christian, charged with the education of the people, and their instruction in the principles of Christianity. The Dutch had also printed versions of the New Testament, a catechism, and several tracts in the language of this and the neighbouring islands. The number of Christians in the township of Seba alone was estimated at six hundred. If the character given by Mr Lange of these islanders was correct, a true Christian missionary would have found a prolific field open to him among them.

The Endeavour left the interesting island of Savu on September 21, 1770, and made Java Head, at the west end of Java, on October 1. Poor Tupia was very ill, and on the morning of the next day a boat was sent on shore to procure some fresh fruit for him, and some grass for the buffaloes, which, with sheep, pigs, and fowls, had recently been got on board. On passing through the Straits of Sunda, the Endeavour was boarded by the Dutch authorities, and various official inquiries were made as to whence she had come, and the object of her voyage. These being answered, she proceeded to Batavia.

Captain Cook and his companions were received into port by the Dutch governor with all the courtesy and kindness which could be expected. Permission was given them to take up their abode in private residences, although strangers were, as a rule, compelled to live at an hotel, under the direct supervision of the authorities. Leave was also obtained to heave down the ship in order to repair her damages, which were found on inspection to be of a very serious nature. Indeed, in one place the planking was so worn by the grinding on the rocks, that it did not exceed the thickness of the sole of a man’s shoe. Her frame in many places was much shattered, and her pumps had become rotten and utterly useless.

Batavia had long had the reputation of being very unhealthy. The crew, however, thought themselves thoroughly seasoned to all climates, and their rosy countenances contrasted favourably with the pale faces of those who had been even a few weeks at the place. All, indeed, with the exception of Tupia, were in good health when they entered the port. Even he revived at the strange sights which met his gaze as he entered, for the first time, a civilised town. The houses, carriages, streets, people, and a number of other novel objects had the effect on him of fascination. Tayeto expressed his wonder and delight with still less restraint, and danced along the street in a kind of ecstasy, examining every object with a restless and eager curiosity. Tupia, remarking the various dresses of the people of different countries, desired likewise to put on his native costume. South Sea cloth was therefore sent for from the ship, in which he immediately equipped himself.

In the course of a few days, however, the effects of the climate began to be felt. Poor Tupia, after the excitement caused by the novelties he witnessed had subsided, experienced a reaction, and every day grew worse and worse. Young Tayeto also was seized with an inflammation of the lungs, and both Dr Solander and Mr Banks and his two servants were taken seriously ill; indeed, almost all the people belonging to the ship, on board or ashore, were sick, affected by the low swampy situation of the place, and the numberless dirty canals which intersected the town in all directions.

Tents were then set up on shore, on Cooper’s Island, for the ship’s company, and one was also pitched, by Mr Banks’s desire, for Tupia, who was anxious to escape from the close air of the town. Mr Banks accompanied him, and remained with him for two days, till compelled by his own illness (a regular tertian ague) to return to his lodgings. Mr Monkhouse, the surgeon of the ship, was the first victim, and Dr Solander could with difficulty crawl out of lied to attend his funeral, which Mr Banks, from illness, was unable to do. On the 9th the poor young boy Tayeto died, and Tupia, who loved him as a son, was so much affected that he rapidly sank, and in two days followed him to the grave. The lives of Mr Banks and Dr Solander were saved by their removal to a healthy spot, some miles from the city. Altogether, seven persons who had come in the ship were buried at Batavia; but many others imbibed the seeds of disease, which, in a short time, proved fatal.

Every possible assistance which Captain Cook required was given by the Dutch governor, and on December 26th, 1770, having taken leave of him and the principal people in the place, the voyagers set sail from Batavia with a light breeze from south-west. At that time the number of sick on board amounted to forty, and the rest of the ship’s company were in a very feeble condition. Every man had been ill except one, the sail-maker, who was upwards of seventy years of age; he, however, was among those who died on the passage to the Cape of Good Hope.

After leaving Java, the Endeavour touched at Prince’s Island, where she took in water and fresh provisions. Shortly afterwards, dysenteries and slow fevers appeared, and so violent were the symptoms that the ship was a complete hospital, those who were able to move about being insufficient to attend to the sick in their hammocks. Mr Banks was so ill that his life was despaired of. Mr Green, Mr Sporing, Mr Parkinson, the natural history painter, with Mr Monkhouse, and many others, three-and-twenty persons in all, in addition to the seven buried at Batavia, died before the ship reached the Cape of Good Hope. On March 15 the Endeavour anchored in Table Bay, near the Cape of Good Hope, where Captain Cook’s first care was to provide a place for the sick on shore. Here the greater number recovered, though some were still ill when again taken on board. The country appeared to the voyagers to be of a most sterile and forlorn character, and from the accounts they received of the great distances from each other at which the settlers were situated, they conjectured that such must be the general nature of the country in the interior. Possibly the Dutch settlers may not have been anxious to praise it to the English, as it must have been obvious that it would prove a very important possession, on account of our extensive commerce with the East Indies.

Cape Town, at that time, consisted of about a thousand houses, neatly built of brick, and white-washed on the outside, with thatched roofs. The streets were broad and commodious, and through the principal street ran a canal, with rows of oaks planted on either side, but, on account of the slope of the ground, having numerous locks. The healthiness of the climate of Cape Town contrasted favourably with that of Batavia, and most of the sick rapidly recovered. The Dutch, at this time, appear to have been living on friendly terms with all the neighbouring tribes of natives, nor did Captain Cook seem to be aware that any of the Hottentots were reduced to a state of slavery. He speaks only of their being servants to the Dutch farmers, and taking care of their cattle. Their only enemies were the bushmen, who never engaged in open warfare, but stole the cattle of their neighbours at night, being armed with lances and poisoned arrows.

The Endeavour left Table Bay on April 14, and after calling at Robin Island, a Dutch convict station, she proceeded with her voyage on the 25th. On that day she lost her master, whose health had been destroyed by intemperate habits, and just before she reached England her first lieutenant, Mr Hicks, died of consumption, from which he had been suffering the greater part of the voyage; thus making up a long catalogue of deaths since the ship left England. Mr Hicks was succeeded by Mr Charles Clerke, who accompanied Captain Cook in his subsequent voyages, and was highly esteemed by his commander, as well as by all who sailed under him.

On May 1 the Endeavour called off Saint Helena, then known only as the summit of a submarine mountain, the water round it being of unfathomable depth; although the island was of especial importance to Indiamen, as it was the only British possession at which they could call on their voyage. Here the Endeavour found the Portland man-of-war, commanded by Captain Elliot, and twelve sail of Indiamen. In company with this fleet, she stood out of the roads on May 4. But finding that his ship sailed more heavily than the rest of the fleet, Captain Cook deposited his logs, or ship’s papers, and some of the journals of his officers, with Captain Elliot; and on the 23rd not one of the ships was in sight.

By this time the rigging and sails of the Endeavour had become so bad that every day something was giving way. But, notwithstanding this, she continued her course in safety, and on June 10 land, which proved to be the Lizard Point, was seen by Nicholas Young, the same boy who first sighted New Zealand. On the 12th the ship came to an anchor in the Downs, and Captain Cook went on shore at Deal.

The importance of the voyage just described can be better appreciated by the present generation than it could have been by those who were alive at the time of its conclusion. Captain Cook’s own modest summary of it is interesting. He says:—

“I sailed from Deptford July 30, 1768; from Plymouth August 26; touched at Madeira, Rio de Janeiro, and Straits of Le Maire; and entered the South Pacific Ocean, by Cape Horn, in January, the following year.

“I endeavoured to make a direct course to Otaheite, and, in part, succeeded; but I made no discovery till I got within the tropic, when I fell in with Lagoon Island, Two Groups, Bird Island, Chain Island, and on April 13 arrived at Otaheite, where I remained three months, during which time the observations on the transit of Venus were made.

“I then left it; discovered and visited the Society Isles, and Oheteroa; thence proceeded to the south till I arrived in the latitude of 40 degrees 22 minutes, longitude 147 degrees 29 minutes West; and on October 6 fell in with the east side of New Zealand. I continued exploring the coast of this country till March 1, 1770, when I quitted it and proceeded to New Holland, and having surveyed the eastern coast of that vast country, which part had not before been visited, I passed between its northern extremity and New Guinea; landed on the latter, touched at the island of Savu, thence to Batavia, the Cape of Good Hope, Saint Helena, and arrived in England on July 12, 1771.”

On their arrival in London, Cook and his companions were received by the scientific, as well as by the great and fashionable world, with the attention and respect they so well-deserved; for no previous expedition undertaken by England had been more generally successful. Cook was promoted to the rank of Commander, his commission being dated August 29, 1771. He was also introduced to the King at Saint James’s Palace, and had the honour of presenting the journal of his voyage, illustrated by maps and charts; while their Majesties the King and Queen, and numerous people of high rank and attainments, took delight in listening to the accounts given by the explorers of their adventures, and in examining the specimens of manufactures and of natural history which they had brought home.

It was not, however, present éclat, nor the apparent magnitude of the discoveries made, but their consequences, which rendered this voyage of real importance. The ultimate result was the founding of two nations of the Anglo-Saxon race; and whatever cause there may be to question, if not to condemn, the manner in which possession has been obtained of distant countries, and in which, also, their colonisation has been effected, in almost every instance, and by almost all nations having the power which civilisation gives, it must still be borne in mind that God has overruled, and is overruling, these transactions for His own glory and for the spiritual benefit of the world. He makes not only “the wrath,” but the ambition, and pride, and cupidity of man “to praise Him;” and then the remainder “He restrains.” And all circumstances are made, in His infinite wisdom and power, to advance the spread of “the glorious Gospel of the blessed God,” and to usher in the kingdom of Him whose right it is to reign, even of Christ Jesus, the Prince of peace, the Lord of lords, and the King of kings.

With regard to the discoveries made in the voyage just recorded, it is almost superfluous to say that the countries then visited for the first time by our countrymen have, after the lapse of a century, become familiar as household words to the whole world. Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand have become component parts of the British empire, and have already been made the home of hundreds of thousands of the crowded population of the British Isles, as well as of emigrants from other European countries; and these lands will, probably, before another century has passed away, become centres, not only of civilisation, but of evangelical truth and saving faith. And herein the Christian reader will and must rejoice.

Note 1. The names of several places visited by Captain Cook have, in course of time, been varied or altered. In this work, however, it has been thought proper generally to adhere to the original nomenclature.

Note 2. A tablet has been placed to mark the spot where Captain Cook and his party landed, and may be seen in the engraving.

Note 3. If this was so understood at the time, we must lament that our countrymen should have consented to take part in what must be considered as a profane farce.

Chapter Three.

Second Voyage of Discovery. June 1772 to July 1775.

It had long been the opinion of geographers that a great southern continent existed; and in 1738 a French expedition, under Monsieur Lozier Bouvet, had been sent out in search of it. On January 1, 1739, he got sight of land, in latitude 45 degrees 20 minutes, and longitude 25 degrees 47 minutes East from Teneriffe. It was, according to his description, a lofty and steep cape, backed by mountains mostly covered with snow, while the coast had so broad a fringe of ice that it was impossible to approach it near enough to make any thorough examination. In remembrance of the day of discovery, the cape, which was supposed to be part of the southern continent, was called Cape de la Circoncision.

It had been supposed, before the return of Cook from his first voyage, that New Zealand, New Holland, and New Guinea formed part of the great southern land, which was generally denominated Terra Australis Incognita.

Cook, indeed, dispelled this idea by proving that these three territories were islands; but the question as to the existence of the great southern land still remained to be proved.

The subject was under discussion by men of science when the Endeavour returned from her first voyage; and the Royal Society soon afterwards resolved to recommend the despatch of another expedition, for the purpose of attempting to settle the question. An offer of the command of this exploratory voyage was at once made to Captain Cook, who gladly accepted it—the selection of ships suitable for the purpose being wisely left to his judgment. The qualities he considered essential were great capacity, or stowage room, a rig easily worked, a size not too large to enter small harbours, and a build which would enable the vessel to take the ground and be easily got off again.

The Endeavour, having been sent out to the Falkland Islands as a store ship, was not available; two more vessels, therefore, made by the same ship-builder as the Endeavour, were purchased at Hull. The largest, named the Resolution, was of four hundred and sixty-two tons burden; and the other, called the Adventure, was three hundred and thirty-six tons. Captain Cook took possession of the former, as commander of the expedition; and Tobias Furneaux, who had been second lieutenant with Captain Wallis, was promoted and appointed to serve under Cook in command of the Adventure.

Captain Cook’s first lieutenant was Robert Cooper; his second, Charles Clerke, who had accompanied him on his previous voyage, as had also his third lieutenant, Richard Pickersgill, and the lieutenant of marines, John Edgecombe, with two of the warrant and several of the petty officers.

Mr Banks and Dr Solander had intended going, but not finding the accommodation on board which they considered necessary for the comfort and convenience of themselves and their attendants, they gave up the project. So great, however, was the public enthusiasm on the subject of the expedition, that, according to Boswell, even Dr Johnson thought of applying for leave to accompany it, though, if he ever seriously entertained the wish, it was speedily abandoned.

Two astronomers, Mr William Wales and Mr William Bayley, were engaged by the Board of Longitude—the former sailing in the Resolution, the latter in the Adventure. The Admiralty appointed, as landscape-painter, Mr William Hodges; and Mr John Reinhold Forster, and his son, were engaged to attend to the department of natural history. The Board of Longitude also amply furnished the expedition with the best astronomical and other instruments which might be required, and with four watch-machines, as chronometers were then called. Lord Sandwich, who was at the head of the Admiralty Board, anxiously watched the equipment of the ships, visiting them from time to time to satisfy himself that everything was done in the best way to secure the success of the undertaking and the comfort and health of those on board.

Captain Cook had, in his former voyage, paid great attention to the means best adapted for preserving the health of his crew, and he had seen the importance of having an ample supply of provisions of an anti-scorbutic character. He also endeavoured to have the ship well dried and ventilated, and determined, as far as possible, that the men’s clothes should be kept dry, and their persons clean. Each ship had two years and a half provisions on board, and among other articles were wheat and sugar (in lieu of oatmeal), oil, malt, salted cabbage, portable broth, mustard, marmalade of carrots, and inspissated juice of wort, from which beer could be at once made. The frame of a vessel of twenty tons was put on board each ship, to be set up, if found necessary, to serve as tenders, or to enable the crews to escape should the ships be wrecked. The Resolution had a complement of one hundred and twelve officers and men, and the Adventure of eighty-one. Fishing-nets and hooks of all sorts, articles to barter with the natives or to bestow as presents, and additional clothing for the crews were put on board. Medals also were struck, with the likeness of his Majesty on one side, and of the two ships on the other, to be given to the inhabitants of newly-discovered countries, as memorials of the explorers’ visit. Indeed, no expedition with a similar object in view had ever left the shores of England so well equipped in every respect as was the one now about to sail.

The Resolution, being ready for sea, sailed from Deptford on April 9, 1772; but after being joined by the Adventure, she was detained by contrary winds till May 10, when, both again sailing, the Resolution was found to be so crank (Note 1) that it was necessary to lower her upper works, and for this purpose she put into Sheerness. Lord Sandwich and Sir Hugh Palliser went down to see the alterations made in an effectual manner. On June 22, the ship, being again ready for sea, sailed from Sheerness and joined the Adventure in Plymouth Sound on July 3. Thus it will be seen that there was a delay of nearly three months after the expedition was supposed to be ready, before it was fully prepared for sea. Lord Sandwich and Sir Hugh Palliser again visited the ships in Plymouth Sound, and the chronometers being set going in the presence of the astronomers and the chief officers, the ships at length, on July 13, set sail and shaped a course for Madeira.

Anchoring in Funchal Roads on the 29th, and having taken on board fresh beef and vegetables, including onions, for sea stores, the ships sailed again on August 1. Finding their water run short, they put into Porto Praya, in the island of Saint Jago, one of the Cape de Verde Islands, for a supply. On October 29 the land of the Cape of Good Hope was made, but as the ships were unable to get in before dark, they stood off and on during the night. In the evening the phosphorescence of the sea became unusually brilliant; and to convince Mr Forster, who differed from Mr Banks and Dr Solander that it was caused by insects, some buckets of water were drawn up from alongside. On examination he found that the water was full of globular insects of the size of a pin’s head, and quite transparent.

The next day the ships anchored off Cape Town, where Captain Cook and his officers were received by the Governor and other authorities with attention and respect. The Governor informed Captain Cook that a French ship had discovered land in the meridian of the Mauritius, in latitude 48 degrees South; and also that in the previous March two French ships, under Monsieur Marion, had touched at the Cape on their way to explore the South Pacific.

The expedition quitted the Cape of Good Hope on November 22, and steered a course towards Cape Circumcision, which was the first object for which they were directed to search. They soon found the weather very cold, when warm clothing was issued; and having encountered a heavy gale, with hail and rain, which drove them far to the eastward of their course, all hope of reaching the looked-for cape was given up. Owing, also, to the severity of the weather, and the sudden transition from dry heat to extreme cold and wet, the ships’ companies suffered a severe misfortune in the loss of nearly all the live-stock (consisting of sheep, hogs, and geese) which they had brought with them from Cape Town. This weather continued for the greater part of the time the ships remained in that high latitude. On December 10 an island of ice was seen in latitude 50 degrees 40 minutes South and 2 degrees 0 minutes East of the Cape of Good Hope. After this thick, hazy weather again came on, with sleet and snow. The ships continued their course, the Resolution leading, when an iceberg, directly for which they were steering, was discovered through the mist not a mile off. It was about fifty feet high, flat at top, about half a mile in circumference, and its sides, against which the sea broke furiously, rose perpendicularly from the ocean. Captain Furneaux, who was astern, took this ice for land, and hauled off from it; and there is no doubt that many navigators who have reported land in these latitudes have been deceived in the same way.

Nothing could be more trying to the explorers than the navigation in which they were now engaged, day after day tacking off and on among large fields of ice, through which they in vain endeavoured to find a passage to the southward, with the constant risk, in thick weather, of running foul of icebergs, or of getting fast in the packed ice which might any moment enclose them, while all the time they were exposed to storms of snow and sleet, with a constant frost, although it was the middle of summer. Dangerous as it was sailing among icebergs, or, as Captain Cook calls them, ice-rocks, especially in thick weather, the ships were in still greater peril when surrounded by packed ice, which consisted of huge slabs, of great thickness, varying from thirty or forty feet down to three or four feet square, packed close together, and often piled one on another. Stout as were the ships, it was not expected that they could resist the enormous pressure to which they would be subjected should they get caught in such frozen bonds. It was the opinion of those on board that this sort of ice was formed only in bays and rivers, and that therefore they must be near land, which was eagerly though vainly looked-for. So severe was the cold that an iceberg examined by the master had no water running down it, as is generally the case in summer.

Captain Cook now steered to the west, in the hope of getting round the ice; but though he held on this course for some time, both to the south and west of the supposed position of Cape Circumcision, he neither fell in with it, nor did he observe any of the usual indications of land. Various birds, however, were seen, and several of them were shot; but as they would find roosting-places on the ice islands, they might have come a very great distance from the land. Thus, the penguins, which were seen in great numbers on some icebergs, and are supposed never to go far from land, might have come a very great distance over the ice from their native haunts. Be that as it may, no land was seen by either vessel, notwithstanding the diligent search made for it.

On December 31, while the ships were still surrounded by ice, a strong gale sprang up, with a heavy sea, which made it very dangerous for them to remain in the position in which they then were. The peril was yet further increased by an immense field of ice which appeared to the north, extending from north-east by east to south-west by west, and between two and three miles off. The ships received several severe blows from masses of ice of the largest size. Providentially, they got clear by the afternoon, for at that time the wind increased so much that it was necessary to haul the top-sails and to strike topgallant masts. The next day the wind abated, but the weather continued thick and hazy, with sleet and snow which froze on the rigging as it fell, and ornamented the whole of it with icicles. At length the longitude in which the looked-for cape was supposed to lie was reached, and as the ships were far to the southward of the latitude in which Captain Bouvet stated he had seen it, no doubt remained that he had mistaken lofty icebergs, surrounded by loose or field ice, for land, as Captain Cook and his officers had already been deceived on the first day they fell in with field ice.

When the weather became finer the ships were able to fill up their water-casks with pure fresh water, by collecting masses of ice, and then hanging them up to allow any salt which might have adhered to them to run off. Whenever the weather permitted, the astronomers were employed in making observations, and the naturalists in collecting birds, the only objects they had the means of obtaining.

The antarctic circle was crossed on January 17, in longitude 39 degrees 35 minutes East; and on the evening of that day the whole sea to the south and west appeared covered with ice, though shortly before none was in sight. In this space thirty-eight ice islands, great and small, were counted, besides loose ice in abundance, so that the ships were obliged to luff to avoid one piece, and to bear up to escape another, as they proceeded to the south. At length a compact mass, from sixteen to eighteen feet high, appearing to the south, without any opening, Captain Cook altered his course to the north. A number of whales were now seen sporting about the ice, and several flocks of antarctic petrels. The ships did not alter their course an hour too soon, for that night a heavy gale sprang up which would have rendered their position very dangerous. After this, search was in vain made for the land said to have been seen by the French captain in the longitude of the Mauritius.

On February 8, during thick weather, the Adventure was separated from the Resolution, and though, according to arrangement, Captain Cook cruised for three days about the spot where his consort had last been seen, and continued burning blue lights and firing guns, he was compelled at last to give up the search. On the night of the 17th the aurora presented a very beautiful appearance. It was first seen in the east, and, gradually rising, formed a brilliant arch across the heavens, with a light sufficiently strong to cast shadows on the deck, and at one time to allow a book to be read. A description of the incidents met with during this part of the voyage would not prove generally interesting. One, however, must not be omitted.

The Resolution being off a large ice island, round which there was a quantity of loose ice, Captain Cook sent two boats to take some on board. The island was not less than half a mile in circumference, and its summit three or four hundred feet above the surface of the sea. While the boats were thus engaged in its neighbourhood, it was seen to bend over till it turned nearly bottom up, though it seemed by the change not to have lost either in height or size. The boats escaped without damage from their dangerous position.

During all the time, up to the separation of the two ships, the crews had enjoyed generally excellent health. A few slight symptoms of scurvy had appeared, but they were quickly subdued by a liberal use of the remedies which had been supplied. The fresh wort made from malt seems to have been very efficacious in arresting the malady. Occasionally, too, when the weather allowed, the men’s bedding and clothes were spread on deck to air, and the ship was smoked and cleaned between decks. This prevented the crews from contracting those diseases which have proved so fatal on board ships where they have been neglected.

At length, by the middle of March, the antarctic summer being nearly over, and his crew requiring rest and his ship refitting, Captain Cook shaped a course which would soon bring her into a more genial clime. He had purposed visiting Van Diemen’s Land, but as the wind would not allow him to shape a course for that country, he steered for New Zealand, which was sighted on March 25. A heavy gale compelled him to keep at sea, but the following day he entered Dusky Bay, at the south-west end of Tavai Poenammoo, or the Middle Island, as it is now called. This was on Friday, March 26, after having been one hundred and seventeen days at sea, and sailed over three thousand six hundred and sixty leagues, or nearly ten thousand miles, without having once sighted land. Only one man, and he of a naturally bad habit of body, had been seriously ill; and Cook attributed the excellent health of his crew, partly to the frequent airing and sweetening of the ship by fires, etcetera, and partly to the portable broth, sweet-wort, pickled cabbage, and sour-krout. Although no discovery, except of a negative character, was made during this part of the voyage, we cannot but admire the hardihood and perseverance, the skill and courage, exhibited by the great navigator during the whole of that trying time.

A secure harbour having been found by Lieutenant Pickersgill in Dasky Bay, where the ship could lie close to the shore, she was warped into it and moored, her yards being locked in the branches of the trees; there being also, a hundred yards from her stern, a fine stream of fresh water. No place could have been better suited for refitting the ship and refreshing the crew, and both officers and men enjoyed their stay at this healthy and beautiful spot. Places were forthwith cleared of trees to set up the observatory, the forge, and the tents for the sail-makers and coopers. At the captain’s suggestion, wholesome beer was brewed from the leaves of a tree resembling the American black spruce, mixed with the inspissated juice of wort and molasses. The constant attention of the great navigator to the most minute points calculated to maintain or improve the health of those placed under his charge cannot be too strongly commended. Throughout his journals notices constantly occur which show that whenever anti-scorbutic vegetables, or herbs of any sort, were required, he did not entrust the search to others, but went himself to look for them. It is sad to reflect how indifferent to his example many other navigators have been, especially the masters of merchantmen; and that even at the present day, notwithstanding all the assistance which science is able to render, their crews often suffer fearfully from scurvy.

Shooting and fishing parties now went out constantly, and an ample supply of wild-fowl was obtained. The bay was also surveyed, and found to contain several good harbours. Some exploring expeditions for short distances into the exterior were also started, but very few natives were met with. There appeared, indeed, to be only three or four families settled in the neighbourhood, and it was not understood why they had separated themselves from their countrymen; but it was conjectured that they were the remnant of a tribe which, in one of the frequent native wars, had escaped massacre. Only one of these families became intimate with the strangers, in whom they showed unusual confidence by taking up their quarters very near to the watering-place.

These people evinced little astonishment at sight of a few sheep and goats which, having escaped the effects of the cold, were taken on shore, but stared at them with what appeared to be stupid insensibility; and when various articles of European manufacture were offered to them they received these gifts with indifference, except, indeed, hatchets and spike-nails, the value of which they could comprehend.

After some further acquaintance, the head of this family and his daughter were persuaded to visit the ship. Before venturing on board, he presented to the captain a piece of cloth and a green talc hatchet; he gave another to Mr Forster, and the girl gave one to Mr Hodges. This custom of making presents had been found common with the natives of the South Sea Islands, but had not before been observed among the New Zealanders. After these propitiatory gifts were received, and before stepping on to the stage which led to the deck, the native took a small green branch in his hand, with which he several times struck the ship’s side, while he also repeated a speech or prayer. When this ceremony was concluded he stepped on deck.

On taking leave of this New Zealander, Captain Cook was presented by him with another piece of native cloth, with the expression of a wish for a cloak in return. One of red baize was accordingly given to him, and seemed to afford great satisfaction. Thus far, therefore, on this visit, intercourse with these aborigines of the new country was pleasant and successful.

Other natives were afterwards seen by some of the explorers, who were on a shooting expedition. These set up a hideous noise, and were with difficulty persuaded to approach and lay down their spears. At last one of them came forward, with a plant in his hand, one end of which he presented to Captain Cook, while he himself held the other. He then began a long speech with frequent pauses, and as soon as the captain replied—of course, not understanding a word that was said—the savage proceeded in his harangue. This done, he took off his cloak, which he put on the captain’s shoulders, and seemed to consider that their peace was established. The natives followed the English to the boat, and seeing some muskets lying across the stern, desired them to be taken away, having probably observed their effects on the wild ducks. They then assisted to launch the boat, but it was necessary to keep a watchful eye on them, for they wanted to take away everything in the boat on which they could lay hands. No canoes were observed belonging to these people, two or three logs of wood tied together serving them for crossing rivers; indeed, fish and fowl were so plentiful that they had not far to go in order to procure food.

In accordance with Cook’s desire to benefit the countries he visited, he took five geese which he had brought from the Cape of Good Hope, and left them in a retired cove (which was on that account called Goose Cove), in hope that they might there multiply and be useful to future inhabitants. A garden was also dug, and, with the same object in view, various sorts of garden seeds were sown in it.

On April 28, the tents and other articles being taken on board, the Resolution once more got under way, though, owing to light and contrary winds, it was not till May 11 that she was fairly at sea. She then proceeded along the west coast, towards Queen Charlotte’s Sound, in Cook’s Straits, between the two islands. Nothing of importance occurred till the ship was about three leagues to the westward of Cape Stephens, when just as it fell calm six waterspouts appeared round her, four between her and the land, and one outside; the sixth in the south-west, two or three miles off. Progressing in a crooked line to the north-east, it passed within fifty yards of her stern. A gun had been got ready to fire into it when it should come nearer. The diameter of the base was about sixty feet, the sea within which was much agitated, and foamed up to great height. From this the water appeared to be carried in a spiral stream up to the clouds. Some of the seamen said that they saw a bird in it, which was whirled round like the fly of a jack. During the time the waterspouts were in sight there were light puffs of wind from all points of the compass, while occasionally large drops of rain fell.

On the 18th the Resolution appeared off Queen Charlotte’s Sound, where, greatly to the satisfaction of all on board, her consort, the Adventure, was found to be awaiting her. Her boats soon came out, and the Resolution was brought to an anchor in Ship Cove, close to her. Captain Furneaux at once came on board, and gave Captain Cook a narrative of his proceedings after being separated from him. Having in vain looked-for the Resolution, he bore away to the north, till Van Diemen’s Land was sighted. He sailed along the east coast for some distance, some parts of which appeared fertile and thickly populated. The Adventure lay within Maria Island for five days, to take in wood and water, and then proceeded to the north along shore. For some distance no land was seen, but as the soundings were very regular, Captain Furneaux was of opinion that no straits existed between New Holland and Van Diemen’s Land, but only a very deep bay. Having come to this erroneous opinion, he bore away for New Zealand, and had been five weeks in Ship Cove when the Resolution appeared. He had kept up a friendly intercourse with the natives, who frequently asked for Tupia, and seemed much concerned when told that he was dead.

While at Queen Charlotte’s Sound Captain Cook had a garden planted, as before, and gave the natives some potatoes, explaining their use and the mode of cultivating them. A pair of goats and a boar and two sows were put on shore, in the hopes of their multiplying. A ewe and ram, which had been brought with great trouble and care to the place, were also landed, but the following day were found dead, from having eaten some poisonous plant.

An idea had prevailed on board the Adventure that the natives were ready to sell their children. This Captain Cook soon proved to be incorrect. Their object in bringing them on board was to obtain presents for them. A man brought his son, a boy of about ten years of age, and at first Captain Cook fancied from what he had heard that the object of the father was to sell him, but he soon found that it was merely to obtain a white shirt, which was given. The boy was so proud of it that he went about showing it to everybody he met, till he encountered old Will, the goat, who, making a butt at him, knocked him over in some dirt, sadly soiling his shirt. The boy considered the mischief irreparable, and was afraid of appearing before his father. At last he was brought in by Mr Forster, when he told a lamentable story against the great “dog”—nor was he comforted till his shirt was washed and dried. Captain Cook justly remarks in his journal that this incident shows how easily people can be deceived, when ignorant of the language, as to the customs and habits of the natives of foreign countries.

While these friendly natives were on board, a strange canoe full of people entered the harbour. The natives on seeing them said they were enemies, and two of them mounted the arm chests on the poop, one armed with a native hatchet, and the other with a spear, and, in bravado, bade their enemies defiance. The rest who were on board, jumping into their canoe, went on shore, probably to secure their women and children. The two who remained begged Captain Cook to fire at the strangers. The latter, however, came on board, apparently without having had any evil intentions, and peace was soon established among all parties. The strangers at once asked for Tupia, and hearing that he was dead, one or two expressed their sorrow in a way which appeared more formal than real.

A brisk trade was soon established with the newcomers; but the thoughtless seamen were so ready to give even the clothes off their backs for the merest trifles, neither useful nor ornamental, that the captain was compelled to dismiss the strangers. He afterwards crossed the harbour with Mr Forster and one of the officers to a spot where a hundred natives—men, women, and children—were collected, with six canoes, and apparently all their utensils. These they seem always to carry with them when they go even a short distance from home, lest they should be stolen by their enemies in their absence.

The state of constant warfare and consequent distrust in which they lived, especially in the Middle Island, was very evident, for they were generally found on their guard, travelling or working with their weapons in their hands; even the women were seen occasionally armed with spears. Captain Cook had reason to believe that the entire population of the Sound had changed since he was there in 1770, as he could not recognise the face of a single person he then knew. Those who asked for Tupia had possibly not seen him, but had only heard of him from their countrymen, among whom he was very popular. The immorality of the natives met with during their visit to New Zealand appears to have been very flagrant, and it is sad to reflect that advantage was taken of it by the seamen, without the slightest rebuke or censure from their superiors; indeed, it cannot be discovered from the journals of the officers that they were at all aware of their duties as a Christian people with regard to heathen savages whose shores they visited.

The king’s birthday was spent with the usual festivities, the officers of the two ships dining together.

On June 7, 1773, the two ships put out to sea, with the intention of exploring all the unknown parts of the ocean between the meridian of New Zealand and Cape Horn. In case of separation they were to rendezvous at Otaheite, where Captain Furneaux was to wait till August 20, and then to proceed to Queen Charlotte’s Sound. If not joined at that place before November 20 by Captain Cook, he was to put to sea, and carry out the instructions he had received from the Admiralty. Cook’s object in attempting to explore in so high a latitude during the winter season was to get some of the work done which would otherwise have occupied the precious months of summer; and besides, he wished to show future navigators that it would be practicable to make discoveries even in the depths of winter.

After leaving New Zealand, the course steered was generally about north-east, so that the ships soon got into a warm latitude, and the men once more put on their cool clothing. Sad news was brought on board the Resolution at this time, June 29. It was that scurvy had broken out on board the Adventure; that her cook had died, and that twenty men were ill with that complaint and the flux. The Resolution had only three men on the sick-list, and but one of these had the scurvy. A few others, showing symptoms of it, were supplied with wort, marmalade of carrots, and thickened juice of lemons. It appeared that the crew of the Adventure, during the six weeks they were in Queen Charlotte’s Sound, had eaten no vegetables, partly from not knowing what herbs to gather, and also from the inveterate dislike of the seamen to a new diet. Captain Cook had, from the first, when he thought it necessary, insisted on having wild celery, scurvy grass, and other herbs boiled with the pease and wheat, both for officers and men; and though some refused to eat it, he was firm, and would allow no other food to be served out, so that at last the prejudice wore off. Captain Furneaux instantly made use of all the remedies in his power, and his people improved in health. Still it was necessary for their sakes to put into harbour where vegetables could be procured, and a course was accordingly steered for Otaheite.

Several small low islands, clothed with cocoanut trees, were seen, but the necessity of reaching a harbour without delay prevented their examination.

On August 15, Osnaburg Island, or Maitea, was seen, and the ships then steered for Oaiti-piha Bay, near the south-east end of Otaheite, in order to procure there such refreshments as the place could afford.

At daybreak they found themselves not half a league from a reef, towards which the scud of the sea rapidly sent them, the wind having completely fallen. The depth was too great to anchor, and the boats failed to tow the ships off. A number of natives came off with provisions, but seemed totally unconscious of the dangerous position of the ships. It was curious that, though they recognised Captain Cook and those who had been there before, no one asked for Tupia.

The position of the ships became more and more critical; the captain had hoped to get round the end of the reef, but as they drew nearer and nearer this hope vanished, and shipwreck seemed certain. Just then a passage was discovered through the reef, but a boat being sent ahead to sound, it was found that there was not water sufficient for the ships to pass over: indeed, so strongly did the flood-tide set towards it, that the Resolution seemed nearer than ever to destruction. The horrors of shipwreck stared the explorers in the face; there was no wind to fill their sails; the boats were powerless; the only means of saving the ships was to anchor; but would the anchors hold? They were let go, and the Resolution was brought up in less than three-fathom water, striking at every fall of the sea, while the Adventure brought up close on her bow without striking. Kedge anchors and hawsers were now carried out, and found ground; by hauling on these the ship was got afloat, but there was a fear that these would come home or be cut by the rocks, and nothing could then have saved the Resolution. Happily, they held on till the tide turned, when a light breeze coming off the land both vessels made sail, and got out of danger, though with the loss of several anchors and cables.

The next day the ships anchored in Oaiti-piha Bay, about two cables’ length from the shore. Both ships were crowded with natives, who brought off cocoanuts, plantains, bananas, apples, yams, and other fruits and vegetables, which they exchanged for nails and beads. Presents of shirts and axes were made to several who called themselves chiefs, or earees, and who promised to bring off hogs and fowls, which, however, they did not do. These earees did not scruple to pilfer whatever came in their way, and one of them, who pretended to be very friendly, was found handing articles which did not belong to him out of the quarter-galley. As his companions on deck were behaving in the same way, they were all turned out of the ship, and two muskets were fired over the head of the chief offender to frighten him. On this, he jumped out of his canoe, which, with two others, was brought on board, and a gun was fired along shore, but so as not to hurt any one. This soon cleared the coast. In one of the canoes was a little boy, who was at first very much frightened, but beads were given to him, and he was sent in safety on shore. This quickly restored the confidence of the natives, and all by the evening were again good friends.

The intercourse with the natives now went on with tolerable smoothness, though their thieving propensities frequently nearly brought about a rupture. On one occasion, in Captain Cook’s presence, a native seized the musket of one of the guards on shore, and made off with it. Some of the seamen were sent after him, but he would have escaped had not the natives also given chase, knocked down the thief, and brought back the musket. Although fear may possibly have operated on this occasion with the natives more than a sense of justice, Captain Cook was thankful to them, because he would certainly have lost ten times the value of the weapon in endeavouring to recover it by force.

The following day a thief brought on board a quantity of fruit as a present, among which were a number of cocoanuts, which, after the juice had been extracted, had been thrown away by the seamen. These had been so artfully tied up in bundles that at first the cheat was not perceived. The chief did not seem at all ashamed when the trick was discovered, but having opened a few himself, acknowledged that they were empty. On going on shore, however, he sent off a quantity of plantains and bananas.

A supply of water, fruit, and roots having been got on board, Captain Cook was preparing to sail for Matavai, when it was announced that Waheatoua was coming to meet him. He found the young chief seated in the open air on a stool, surrounded by a large number of attendants, and at once recollected him, having known him when a boy, under the name of Tearee. He had, on the death of his father, Waheatoua, taken his name. The chief begged Captain Cook to remain some months, promising hogs and provisions of all sorts. He insisted on keeping the captain by his side, and whenever they moved about the stool was carried after them, that they might again be seated in the same position.

Before the ships had come to an anchor in Matavai Bay, the decks were covered with natives, many of whom Captain Cook recognised. The king, Otoo, was among those on board, but he took fright without any apparent reason, and landed again. The next day an encampment was made on shore for the sail-makers, coopers, and the sick. This done, Captain Cook, accompanied by Captain Furneaux, Mr Forster, and others, set off to visit Otoo. He was found seated on the ground, under the shade of a tree, with a large crowd round him, all standing uncovered, as a mark of respect; that is, not only their heads bare, but their shoulders, and some wore no clothing above the breast—his father not excepted. Presents were made by Captain Cook, and the king was told that they were given in friendship, and that none would be received in return. The king inquired for Tupia, and for all the officers who were on board the Endeavour on the former voyage. Otoo, though a fine tall young man, was very nervous, and acknowledged that he had left the ship because he was afraid of the guns. On the 27th, however, he came to the camp with a large retinue, having first sent on board a quantity of cloth, fruits, a hog, and two large fish. He, a sister and younger brother, with several attendants, were persuaded to visit the ship, and all received presents, Captain Cook afterwards taking them to their home at Oparree in his boat.

On landing, the captain met a venerable old lady, the mother of Toutaha. She seized him by the hands, and bursting into tears, exclaimed, “Toutaha, the friend of Cook, is dead!” Captain Cook says that he was so much affected that he should have wept also had not Otoo drawn him away. Captain Furneaux made the king a present of a male and female goat, in the hope that they might stock the island.

On another occasion, when Otoo came on board, as he entered the cabin several chiefs who were there immediately uncovered their shoulders, although they did not rise or show him any other mark of respect. He was entertained with the bagpipes, which seemed to have especial charms for the natives. The seamen also danced hornpipes and country dances. In return, the king entertained the voyagers with a dramatic performance, in which his sister took a part. The drama seemed to have reference to the circumstances of the time, as Captain Cook’s name was frequently mentioned. The lady’s dress was very elegant, being decorated with long tassels made of feathers, hanging from the waist downwards. The performance lasted about two hours. So far as the disposition of the natives was concerned, the visit seems to have been satisfactory, though fewer hogs were obtained than were required. Mr Pickersgill was sent about in all directions to obtain them, and in one of his expeditions he saw Oberea, once the person of most importance in the island. She had now become old, poor, and of little consequence.

Otoo was very unwilling that the ships should go, and shed tears when he parted from Captain Cook. A young lad, called Boreo, was taken on board the Resolution. Though he seemed tolerably satisfied, he could not help weeping as he saw his native island left astern. Two days afterwards the ships anchored in the harbour of Owharre, in the island of Huaheine. The two captains, on landing, were received with the greatest cordiality by the natives, who, after a few presents had been distributed amongst them, brought hogs, fowls, dogs, and fruit, which they exchanged for hatchets, nails, and beads; indeed, there seemed every prospect of an abundance of provisions being obtained. The chief, Oree, who had, on Cook’s former visit, exchanged names with him, was still living, and sent word that he was hastening to see him. Before, however, the captain was allowed to leave his boat, five young plantain trees—the emblem of peace employed by the natives—were brought on board separately, and with some ceremony. Three young pigs, their ears ornamented with cocoanut fibre, accompanied the first three, and a dog the fourth. Lastly, the chief sent the inscription engraved on a piece of pewter which had been left with him in July 1769.

This ceremony ended, the guide who had come to conduct the English to the shore requested them to decorate three young plantain trees with looking-glasses, nails, medals, and beads. This being done, they landed with the trees in their hands, and were conducted to the chief through a multitude of people, who made a lane for them to pass. They were then made to sit down a few paces from the chief, and the plantains were taken from them. One was for their god, one for the king, and the third for friendship. Captain Cook then wished to advance to the king, but he was told that the king would come to him, which he did, falling on his neck and embracing him; the tears flowing down his venerable cheeks, showing the affectionate feelings of his heart. His friends were then introduced, and presents were made to them. Cook speaks in the most affectionate terms of Oree; indeed, all his actions showed him to have been an upright, kind-hearted man.

The trading expeditions sent out were so successful that three hundred hogs, besides fowls and vegetables of all sorts, were obtained. It was from this island that Captain Furneaux received on board a young man, named Omai, a native of Ulietea, where he had some property, of which he had been dispossessed by the people of Bolabola. Omai was not a chief, and he was so inferior in figure, complexion, and manners to the chiefs, that Captain Cook was surprised that Captain Furneaux should have selected him. He was not, indeed, a favourable sample of the natives of the Pacific Isles as far as appearance went. Ultimately, however, Omai, by his intelligence and good conduct, won the regard of Captain Cook, who afterwards, in his journal, speaks of him in warm terms of commendation.

Here, as elsewhere, there were thieves and rogues. Mr Sparrman was attacked while wandering in the woods, beaten, and robbed of his clothes and hanger. Oree, on hearing of it, shed tears, and set off in person to recover the clothes, most of which he got back. Altogether, however, the chief and his subjects were among the best disposed of all the people visited during the voyage. He came on board the Resolution as she was leaving the harbour, and did not quit her till he had taken an affectionate farewell of Captain Cook, when nearly half a league out at sea. He then went away in a small canoe, paddled by himself and another man, all the other natives having long before left the ship.

The following morning the ships entered the harbour of Ohamaneno, in the island of Ulietea, where they lay safely moored. The ships were at once surrounded with canoes, and hogs and vegetables were offered in abundance. At first, none of the former would be taken, as the ships were already crowded; but as killing and salting went on, room was made for them; and, in all, four hundred and fifty hogs were collected at this island. Most of them were brought in canoes from different directions to the ship, so that there was very little trading on shore. It was in consequence of the exertions made by Captain Cook in collecting provisions, and the judicious means he employed, that he was able to remain away from home so many years, and to make so many important discoveries.

The chief of that part of the island was Oreo. Captain Cook paid him a visit at his own house, and was cordially received. He, as others had done, inquired after Tupia and the captain’s companions on his former voyage, by name. A play was soon got up—the chiefs daughter and seven men being the actors. The plot was as follows:—A theft was committed in a masterly manner, but discovered before the thief had time to carry off his plunder. He and his accomplice were attacked by those who had charge of it; but the latter were beaten off, and the rogues escaped in triumph. This incident gives a notion of the moral character of the people in that respect. On another occasion Oreo entertained the strangers with a feast, in the native fashion. The floor was strewed thick with leaves, on which hot bread, fruit, and plantains were placed, with two pigs roasted whole—one of about sixty, the other thirty pounds. They were admirably dressed, having been baked in the native underground ovens, all parts being equally cooked. Cocoanuts supplied the beverage, but the visitors had brought some bottles of wine, which the chief seemed to like, as he both then and always filled his glass whenever the bottle came to him, but seemed not to be affected by it. Plays were got up every day for the amusement of the strangers; indeed, the natives seemed anxious in every way to please them. The people of this island appeared to be of a mild, amiable, and timid disposition.

A native lad about eighteen years of age, called Oedidee, joined the Resolution at this island, in the place of Boreo, who, falling in love with a damsel he met with, remained that he might marry her. Oedidee was a native of Bolabola, and a near relation of the great Opoony, chief of that island.

On this his second visit to these islands, Captain Cook, knowing more of the language of the people, was able to gain a better insight into their habits and customs. Among other points, he discovered, without doubt, that human sacrifices were frequently offered up at their morais. At first the natives would only acknowledge that criminals were killed, but afterwards they confessed that any whom the priest chose to denounce were offered up. Thus, a priest who had a dislike to a man might at any moment doom him to death by pronouncing him a bad man. He then sent out his executioners, who, with a couple of blows from their heavy clubs, struck the unsuspecting victim dead at their feet. The corpse was forthwith carried to the morais, when the chief, who was compelled to attend such sacrifices, had the eye offered to him to eat! At some of the islands, the inhabitants of which Captain Cook describes as the most happy on earth, the priests held this terrific power to a fearful extent. At the time of his thus writing he was not aware of the fact which is so strikingly illustrative of the declaration of holy writ, that “the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty.”

On September 17, 1773, the ships were again at sea. It was the intention of Captain Cook to get into the latitude of Middleburg and Amsterdam, in order to touch there before hauling up for New Zealand. At night they generally lay to, lest any land might be passed in the dark. Some small islets clothed with cocoanut trees were passed on the 23rd, and named Hervey’s Islands, but no inhabitants were seen on shore.

Middleburg was reached on October 1, and the following day, as the ships were beating up to an anchorage, two canoes came boldly off to them. Directly the anchors were dropped, the ships were surrounded by canoes, bringing cloth and other curiosities. Among the people who came on board was a chief, whose good services were secured by the present of a hatchet, spike-nails, and other articles. His name was Tioony. He piloted the boats to a place where the landing was very easy, and where a large concourse of people were assembled to receive them with commodities, which they pressed on their visitors, scarcely expecting to receive anything in return. At last, the chief, making the people open right and left, conducted his visitors to his house, which was delightfully situated about three hundred yards from the sea, at the head of a fine lawn under the shade of some shaddock trees. The floor was covered with mats, on which the guests were invited to be seated, the people arranging themselves on the ground in a circle outside. The piper having landed, Captain Cook ordered the bagpipes to be played, and, in return, three young women sang with a very good grace. A present being made to each of these, all the other women commenced singing. Their songs were musical and harmonious, and in no way harsh or disagreeable. The chief had another house in an adjoining plantation, to which his guests were conducted, and where they were entertained with bananas and cocoanuts, and bowls of cava; though, on witnessing the mode of preparing that beverage, the thirst of the visitors was sufficiently quenched. They were seated in an open space in front of the house, which was surrounded with fruit and other trees, whose fragrance filled the air.

The chief, Tioony, went on board and dined, and then, at their request, conducted the strangers through part of the island. There were numerous plantations of fir trees and edible roots, laid out with great judgment, and enclosed with neat fences made of reeds. The ships were crowded the whole day with people trafficking, and perfect good order prevailed. In the evening, on the return of the officers on board, they expressed themselves highly delighted with the country and the very obliging behaviour of the inhabitants, who seemed to vie with each other in doing what they thought would please their visitors.

The group of islands, at one of which the ships now were, was called the Tonga Islands; but Cook, from the treatment he received, named them the Friendly Islands, by which name they are now generally known. Tasman, who discovered them in 1642-3, named the two principal islands Amsterdam and Middleburg. The former is called by the natives Tongatabu, or the Great Tonga; the latter Ea-oo-we. There are other volcanic islands to the north, belonging to the group, not then known.

Leaving Ea-oo-we, or Middleburg, the ships ran down to Tongatabu, keeping about half a mile from the shore, on which the sea broke with a heavy surf. With the aid of glasses it was seen that every part of the shore was laid out in plantations, while the natives were observed running along the shore waving small white flags, which were, of course, looked on as an emblem of peace. They were answered by hoisting a Saint George’s ensign. Several canoes paddled alongside, and the people in them, after presenting the cava root, came boldly on board. The ships anchored in Van Diemen’s Road, just outside the breakers, with a casting-anchor and cable to seaward in forty-seven-fathom water, to prevent them from tailing on the rocks. Their decks were quickly crowded with natives, who brought off only native cloths, for which the seamen too readily gave them clothes. To put a stop to this proceeding, Captain Cook ordered that no sort of curiosities should be purchased by any person whatever. The good effect of this order was visible next morning, when, instead of comparatively useless articles, the natives brought off bananas and cocoanuts in abundance, and some pigs and fowls.

Proper arrangements having been made for conducting the trade, the captains landed under the guidance of a chief, Attago, who had at once singled out Captain Cook as the principal person, and offered him the usual presents. Cook and Attago also exchanged names, the custom of so doing being practised at the Friendly as well as at the Society Islands. The friendly chief pointed out a creek into which the boats could run, and on landing the visitors were seated under the shade of a tree, the people forming a circle round them; but no one attempted to push forward, as was the habit of the Otaheiteans. The officers then begged Attago to show them the country. This, without hesitation, he at once signified his readiness to do.

The first visit was paid to a sort of temple in an open green, raised on the top of an artificial mound, about seventeen feet above the level ground. The mound was of an oblong form, enclosed by a wall, and the building, which differed little from the ordinary dwelling-houses of the people, was of the same shape. On approaching this temple the people seated themselves on the grass, about fifty yards off, when three venerable-looking priests appeared and addressed the strangers, with whom, as soon as their speech was finished, they came and sat down, when some presents were made to them. After this, Attago signified that the strangers were welcome to examine the temple. In the interior were some images, but when Cook inquired if they were Etuas, or gods, Attago kicked them over without any ceremony, to show that he did not look upon them with reverence. Neither Omai nor Oedidee understood the language spoken by the natives of Tonga, consequently it was difficult to ascertain the exact object of the building.

It appears extraordinary to us at the present day, and it is painful to narrate, that Captain Cook should have conceived it right, as he said he did, to make an offering at the altar. He and his companions, therefore, laid down some blue pebbles, coins, nails, and other articles, as presents to the gods of these poor heathens. Unhappily, this proceeding was in accordance with the customs of our countrymen, and even of the English Government in India, who, to a much later period, furnished a money grant to the temple of Juggernaut (one of the principal gods of the Hindoos), and it was only in comparatively modern times that this disgraceful grant was discontinued. In the present instance, however, it did not appear that these offerings were looked upon as particularly sacred, as the chief, Attago, took them up, and placing them in the folds of his dress, appropriated them to himself.

The green in which this temple stood was at the junction of several roads, two or three of which were very much frequented. The high road along which the chief led the strangers was perfectly level, and sixteen feet broad; many others led into it, and all were enclosed on each side with neat fences made of reeds, and shaded from the scorching sun by fruit trees. Not an inch of ground was waste; the roads occupied no more space than was necessary, while the fences did not take up above four inches on each side, and even this was not wholly lost, for many of them were composed of useful trees or shrubs. Numbers of people were met, some travelling down to the ships with their burdens of fruits and other articles for barter. All courteously got out of the road, sitting down or standing with their backs to the fences as their visitors passed.

At most of the cross roads the temples just described were seen standing on mounds, but were surrounded by palisades instead of stone walls. After walking several miles a larger temple than usual was reached, and near it was a house, at which the party stopped, and were treated with fruit and other provisions, while an old priest made a long speech. These temples at the cross roads remind us of the shrines set up to legendary saints in Roman Catholic countries.

The party returned on board with Attago, and while at dinner they received a visit from an old chief of superior rank, in whose presence the former would not sit down or eat. As soon, however, as the old man was gone, Attago took his place, finished his dinner, and drank two glasses of wine.

Here, as at most places, the natives of inferior rank showed a disposition to thieve. Poor Mr Wales was found seated on the shore, unable to move, for having, when landing, in order to wade to the shore, taken off his shoes and stockings, a native had run off with them, and it was impossible for him to follow over the sharp coral rocks. Attago, however, soon discovered the thief, and had the stolen garments returned. On two or three other occasions the boats were pillaged, and a man, having run off with a seaman’s jacket, though hotly pursued and fired at, would not abandon his prize till intercepted by some of the English on shore. A native also got into the master’s cabin, and had stolen some articles, when, as he was leaping through the port into his canoe to escape, he was discovered. He was pursued by one of the boats, when, taking to the water, he dived under her several times, just as the men thought they were about to catch hold of him. Finally, he contrived to unship the rudder, and thus rendering the boat unmanageable, made his escape.

Just as the explorers were about to sail, it was discovered that there was a much greater person in the island than any one they had yet seen. Mr Pickersgill, who had met him, said that the people paid him