Island, and thence to go on to Sydney. The _Dragon_, meantime,
was to continue her course to the north-west, visiting Santa Cruz, the
Solomon Islands, New Ireland, and New Britain; and she also was to visit
Sydney. Thence the two ships were to recross the Pacific, to touch at
the Sandwich Islands, and to go on to Vancouver's Island and British
Columbia; after which, all hands heartily hoped that they might be
ordered home. The projected cruise was being discussed in the
midshipmen's berth, with the chart on the table.

"It doesn't look so very far," observed Billy Blueblazes; "though,
considering that we are to perform the distance under sail, it will take
us some time, I suppose."

"I rather think so, laddie," observed Archie, who had a pair of
compasses in his hand, and was measuring off the distances; "we shall
have run over between sixty and seventy thousand miles of salt water
before we drop anchor in Portsmouth harbour,--not an inch less according
to my calculation,--it would be enough to wear the sheathing off the
ship's bottom if it was not pretty thick to begin with."

Most of the islands the ship visited were lofty, the hills covered
thickly with trees to their summits. They were surrounded by coral
reefs, through which, in many instances, no passage was to be found;
others had openings affording secure harbours within them. After
visiting several small islands in the neighbourhood, the ship came to an
anchor in a sheltered harbour in the island of Santa Cruz. Canoes
quickly gathered round her, full of the ugliest-looking natives they had
yet met with. Their skin was nearly black, their heads covered with
thick woolly hair, their foreheads low and receding, their faces broad,
with high cheek-bones, their noses flat, and their mouths large. They
had adorned their bodies with various colours, and ornamented themselves
further with rings through their noses and ears, as also with armlets
and necklaces of human teeth; the rest of their dress consisting only of
a string round the waist, to which a small apron was secured. These
unattractive-looking personages were considerably under the ordinary
size, but appeared, notwithstanding the character bestowed on them of
being the most cruel and treacherous in the Pacific Ocean, to be a
good-tempered, merry race. They brought off large quantities of
cocoanuts, bows, arrows, and mats, which they were willing to exchange
for empty bottles, old-clothes, and tobac