ld" after every
visit of a ship. The Fijian tradition certainly dates from a few years
before the beginning of the last century.

The real discoverers of Fiji seem to have been Oliver, master's mate;
Renouard, midshipman; James Dodds, quartermaster, and six seamen of the
_Pandora_, who formed the crew of Edwards' tender; and surely no ship
that ever ventured among those dangerous islands was so ill furnished for
repelling attack. Edwards had sent provisions and ammunition on board of
her when off Palmerston Island, but by this time they were exhausted, and
a fresh supply was actually on the _Pandora's_ deck when she parted
company. Her provision for the long and dangerous voyage before her was a
bag of salt, a bag of nails and ironware, a boarding netting, and several
seven-barrelled pieces and blunderbusses. She had besides the latitude
and longitude of the places the _Pandora_ would touch at.

The following account of their cruise is drawn from the remarks of
Edwards and Hamilton on finding the tender safe in Samarang, for I have
searched the Record Office in vain for Oliver's log. If he kept any, it
was not thought worth preserving. On the night the tender parted company,
the 22nd June, 1791, the natives of the south-east end of Upolu made a
determined attack upon the little vessel with their canoes. The
seven-barrelled pieces made terrible havoc among them, but, never having
seen fire-arms, and not understanding the connection between the fall of
their comrades and the report, they kept up the attack with great fury.
But for the boarding netting they would easily have taken the schooner,
and indeed, one fellow succeeded in springing over it, and would have
felled Oliver with his club had he not been shot dead at the moment of
striking. On the 23rd they cruised about in search of the _Pandora_ until
the afternoon when, having drunk their last drop of water, they gave her
up, and made sail for Namuka, the appointed rendezvous. The torture they
suffered from thirst on the passage was such that poor Renouard, the
midshipman, became delirious, and continued so for many weeks. Their
leeway and the easterly current combined to set them to the westward of
Namuka, and the first land they made was Tofoa, which they mistook for
Namuka, their rendezvous. The natives, the same that had attacked Bligh
so treacherously two years before, sold them provisions and water, and
then made an attempt to take the vessel, and would have suc