which abound on the islands of the group. I was allowed to go with them.
Little did I think I should never again see his kindly face when I took
my seat in the boat and was rowed ashore. Besides Ohlsen and myself,
there were two English seamen, a negro named King and a Tahitian native.
The youngest of the English sailors was named Robert Eury; he was about
twenty-two years of age, and a great favourite of the captain who knew
his family in Dorset, England.

"We hauled the boat up on a small sandy beach, and then started off into
the country, and by noon we had caught three large tortoises which we
found feeding on cactus plants. Then, as we were resting and eating, we
suddenly heard the report of a heavy gun, and then another and another.
We clambered up the side of a rugged hill, from the summit of which we
could see the harbour, a mile distant, and there was the _Britannia_
lying at anchor, and being attacked by two vessels! As we watched the
fight we saw one of the strange ships, which were both under sail, fire
a broadside at our vessel, and the second, putting about, did the same.
These two broadsides, we afterwards heard, were terribly disastrous,
for the captain and three men were killed, and nine wounded. The crew,
however, under the mate, still continued to work her guns with the
utmost bravery and refused to surrender. Then a lucky shot from one
of her 9-pounders disabled the rudder of the largest Frenchmen, which,
fearing to anchor so near to such a determined enemy, at once lowered
her boats and began to tow out, followed by her consort. At the entrance
to the bay, however, the smaller of the two again brought-to and began
firing at our poor ship with a 24-pounder, or other long-range gun, and
every shot struck. It was then that the mate and his crew, enraged at
the death of the captain, and finding that the ship was likely to be
pounded to pieces, determined to get under weigh and come to close
quarters with the enemy, for the _Britannia_ was a wonderfully fast
ship, and carried a crew of fifty-seven men. But first of all he sent
ashore Mrs. Rossiter, her two children, a coloured steward, and all the
money and other valuables in case he should be worsted. His name was
Skinner, and he was a man of the most undaunted resolution, and had at
one time commanded a London privateer called the _Lucy_, which had
made so many captures that Skinner was quite a famous man. But his
intemperate habits caused him to lose