going amongst multitudes, where perhaps we might lose
everything. A party therefore sufficiently strong I determined should go
another route as soon as the sun became lower, and they cheerfully
undertook it.

About two o'clock in the afternoon the party set out but, after suffering
much fatigue, they returned in the evening without any kind of success.

At the head of the cove about 150 yards from the waterside there was a
cave; the distance across the stony beach was about 100 yards, and from
the country into the cove there was no other way than that which I have
already described. The situation secured us from the danger of being
surprised, and I determined to remain on shore for the night with a part
of my people that the others might have more room to rest in the boat
with the master, whom I directed to lie at a grapnel and be watchful in
case we should be attacked. I ordered one plantain for each person to be
boiled and, having supped on this scanty allowance with a quarter of a
pint of grog, and fixed the watches for the night, those whose turn it
was laid down to sleep in the cave, before which we kept up a good fire
yet notwithstanding we were much troubled with flies and mosquitoes.

May. Friday 1.

At dawn of day the party set out again in a different route to see what
they could find, in the course of which they suffered greatly for want of
water: they however met with two men, a woman, and a child: the men came
with them to the cove and brought two coconut shells of water. I
endeavoured to make friends of these people and sent them away for
breadfruit, plantains, and water. Soon after other natives came to us;
and by noon there were thirty about us, from whom we obtained a small
supply; but I could only afford one ounce of pork and a quarter of a
breadfruit to each man for dinner, with half a pint of water, for I was
fixed in my resolution not to use any of the bread or water in the boat.

No particular chief was yet among the natives: they were notwithstanding
tractable, and behaved honestly, exchanging the provisions they brought
for a few buttons and beads. The party who had been out informed me of
their having seen several neat plantations, so that it remained no longer
a doubt of there being settled inhabitants on the island, for which
reason I determined to get what I could, and to sail the first moment
that the wind and weather would allow us to put to sea.

I was much puzzled in what manner to a