with the natives, who reside in and about this port, I
am, I confess, disposed to think, that it will be no very
difficult matter, in due time, to conciliate their friendship and
confidence; for although they generally appear armed on our first
meeting, which will be allowed to be very natural, yet, whenever
we have laid aside our arms, and have made signs of friendship,
they have always advanced unarmed, with spirit, and a degree of
confidence scarcely to be expected: from that appearance of a
friendly disposition, I am inclined to think, that by residing
some time amongst, or near them, they will soon discover that we
are not their enemies; a light they no doubt considered us in on
our first arrival.

The men in general are from five feet six inches, to five feet
nine inches high; are thin, but very straight and clean made;
walk very erect*, and are active. The women are not so tall, or
so thin, but are generally well made; their colour is a rusty
kind of black, something like that of soot, but I have seen many
of the women almost as light as a mulatto. We have seen a few of
both sexes with tolerably good features, but in general they have
broad noses, large wide mouths, and thick lips; and their
countenance altogether not very prepossessing; and what makes
them still less so, is, that they are abominably filthy; they
never clean their skin, but it is generally smeared with the fat
of such animals as they kill, and afterwards covered with every
sort of dirt; sand from the sea beach, and the ashes from their
fires, all adhere to their greasy skin, which is never washed,
except when accident, or the want of food, obliges them to go
into the water.

[* See a plate of the natives in Phillip's
Voyage.]

Some of the men wear a piece of wood or bone, thrust through
the septum of the nose, which, by raising the opposite sides of
the nose, widens the nostril, and spreads the lower part very
much; this, no doubt, they consider as a beauty; most of those we
had hitherto met, wanted the two foremost teeth on the right side
of the upper jaw; and many of the women want the two lower joints
of the little finger of the left hand, which we have not as yet
been able to discover the reason or meaning of. This defect of
the little finger we have observed in old women, and in young
girls of eight or nine years old; in young women who have had
children, and in those who have not, and the finger has been seen
perfect in individuals o