ey intended spending a few days in the entrance of the
Straits to look for us.

We immediately set about getting the ship ready for sea as fast as
possible; erected our tents; sent the cooper on shore to repair the
casks; and began to unstow the hold, to get at the bread that was in
butts; but on opening them found a great quantity of it entirely
spoiled, and most part so damaged, that we were obliged to fix our
copper oven on shore to bake it over again, which undoubtedly delayed us
a considerable time. Whilst we lay here, the inhabitants came on board
as before, supplying us with fish, and other things of their own
manufacture, which we bought of them for nails, &c. and appeared very
friendly, though twice in the middle of the night they came to the tent,
with an intention to steal; but were discovered before they could get
any thing into their possession.

On the 17th of December, having refitted the ship, completed our water
and wood, and got every thing ready for sea, we sent our large cutter,
with Mr Rowe, a midshipman, and the boat's crew, to gather wild greens
for the ship's company; with orders to return that evening, as I
intended to sail the next morning. But on the boat's not returning the
same evening, nor the next morning, being under great uneasiness about
her, I hoisted out the launch, and sent her with the second lieutenant,
Mr Burney, manned with the boat's crew and ten marines, in search of
her. My orders to Mr Burney were first, to look well into East Bay, and
then to proceed to Grass Cove, the place to which Mr Rowe had been sent;
and if he heard nothing of the boat there, to go farther up the sound,
and come back along the west shore. As Mr Rowe had left the ship an hour
before the time proposed, and in a great hurry, I was strongly persuaded
that his curiosity had carried him into East Bay, none in our ship
having ever been there; or else, that some accident had happened to the
boat, either by going adrift through the boat-keeper's negligence, or by
being stove among the rocks. This was almost every body's opinion; and
on this supposition, the carpenter's mate was sent in the launch, with
some sheets of tin. I had not the least suspicion that our people had
received any injury from the natives, our boats having frequently been
higher up, and worse provided. How much I was mistaken, too soon
appeared; for Mr Burney having returned about eleven o'clock the same
night, made his report of a horrible