and people came on
board, with the water and refreshments, but the cutter, in coming off,
shipped a sea, which almost filled her with water: The barge was happily
near enough to assist her, by taking great part of her crew on board,
while the rest freed her, without any other damage than the loss of the
cocoa-nuts and greens that were on board. At noon, I hoisted the boats
in, and there being a great sea, with a dreadful surf rolling in upon
the shore, and no anchorage, I thought it prudent to leave this place,
with such refreshments as we had got. The people who had resided on
shore, saw no appearance of metal of any kind, but several tools, which
were made of shells and stones, sharpened and fitted into handles, like
adzes, chissels, and awls. They saw several canoes building, which were
formed of planks, sewed together, and fastened to several small timbers,
that passed transversely along the bottom and up the sides. They saw
several repositories of the dead, in which the body was left to putrefy
under a canopy, and not put into the ground.

When we sailed, we left a union jack flying upon the island, with the
ship's name, the time of our being here, and an account of our taking
possession of this place, and Whitsun Island, in the name of his
Britannic Majesty, cut on a piece of wood, and in the bark of several
trees. We also left some hatchets, nails, glass bottles, beads,
shillings, sixpences, and halfpence, as presents to the natives, and an
atonement for the disturbance we had given them. Queen Charlotte's
Island is about six miles long, and one mile wide, lies in latitude
19 deg.18'S., longitude, by observation, 138 deg.4'W.; and we found the
variation here to be 4 deg.46'E.

We made sail with a fine breeze, and, about one o'clock, saw an island
W. by S., Queen Charlotte's Island at this time bearing E. by N. distant
fifteen miles. At half an hour after three, we were within about three
quarters of a mile of the east end of the island, and ran close along
the shore, but had no soundings. The east and west ends are joined to
each other by a reef of rocks, over which the sea breaks into a lagoon,
in the middle of the island, which, therefore, had the appearance of two
islands, and seemed to be about six miles long, and four broad. The
whole of it is low land, full of trees, but we saw not a single cocoa
nut, nor any huts: We found, however, at the westermost end, all the
canoes and people who had fled, at our ap