large, there was no underwood; and could distinguish
that many of them were of the palm kind, and some of them cabbage trees:
After many a wishful look we were obliged to return, with our curiosity
rather excited than satisfied, and about five in the evening got on
board the ship. About this time it fell calm, and our situation was by
no means agreeable: We were now not more than a mile and a half from the
shore, and within some breakers, which lay to the southward; but happily
a light breeze came off the land, and carried us out of danger. With
this breeze we stood to the northward, and at day-break we discovered a
bay, which seemed to be well sheltered from all winds, and into which
therefore I determined to go with the ship. The pinnace being repaired,
I sent her, with the master, to sound the entrance, while I kept turning
up, having the wind right out. At noon, the mouth of the bay bore N.N.W.
distant about a mile, and seeing a smoke on the shore, we directed our
glasses to the spot, and soon discovered ten people, who, upon our
nearer approach, left their fire, and retired to a little eminence,
whence they could conveniently observe our motions. Soon after two
canoes, each having two men on board, came to the shore just under the
eminence, and the men joined the rest on the top of it. The pinnace,
which had been sent ahead to sound, now approached the place, upon which
all the Indians retired farther up the hill, except one, who hid himself
among some rocks near the landing-place. As the pinnace proceeded along
the shore, most of the people took the same route, and kept abreast of
her at a distance; when she came back, the master told us, that in a
cove a little within the harbour, some of them had come down to the
beach, and invited him to land by many signs and words of which he knew
not the meaning; but that all of them were armed with long pikes, and a
wooden weapon shaped somewhat like a cymitar. The Indians who had not
followed the boat, seeing the ship approach, used many threatening
gestures; and brandished their weapons; particularly two, who made a
very singular appearance, for their faces seemed to have been dusted
with a white powder, and their bodies painted with broad streaks of the
same colour, which, passing obliquely over their breasts and backs,
looked not unlike the cross-belts worn by our soldiers; the same kind of
streaks were also drawn round their legs and thighs like broad garters:
Each of t