with us, in order to secure their fidelity and honesty, especially those
who were most useful in our domestic concerns; but on explaining to them
that even bread was not to be obtained in England without labour, they
lost hopes of their favourite voyage.
Large presents were now brought us for our sea-store; and notwithstanding
Mr. Bentham our purser having most liberally supplied the ship with four
pounds of fresh pork per man each day, it made no apparent scarcity;
beside salting some thousand weight, and a prodigious number of goats,
fowls, and other things. Could we have made it convenient to have staid
another week, some cows were promised to have been sent us from a
neighbouring island. Capt. Cook had left with them a horse and mare, a
cow with calf, and a bull; but, from some mistake, they killed a horse
instead of one of the cows, and found it very tough, disagreeable eating,
by which means they were disgusted with all the horned cattle, and drew
an unfavourable conclusion that their meat was all of the same texture.
Had some pains been taken with them, to get the better of a dislike they
have to milk, and explained to them how variously it might be employed as
food, I have no doubt but they would have paid more attention to the
horned cattle. They used to persist in saying that milk was urine; but on
pointing to a woman that was suckling her child, and pushing their own
argument, they seemed convinced of their error. We have left them a goose
and a gander, which they take a great delight in.
Edea, the Queen, endeavoured to conquer that absurd dislike, and at last
became fond of milk in her tea.
A painting of Capt. Cook, done in oil by Webber, which had been delivered
to Capt. Edwards on his first landing, was now returned to them. It is
held by them in the greatest veneration; and I should not be surprised
if, one day or other, divine honours should be paid to it. They still
believe Capt. Cook is living; and their seeing Mr. Bentham our purser,
whom they perfectly recollected as having been the voyage with him, and
spoke their language, will confirm them in that opinion.
The harbour was surveyed by Mr. Geo. Passmore, the master, an able and
experienced officer.
Our officers here, as at Rio Janeiro, showed the most manly and
philanthropic disposition, by giving up their cabins, and sacrificing
every comfort and convenience for the good of mankind, in accommodating
boxes with plants of the Bread-fruit tree, that the laudable intentions
of government might not be frustrated from the loss of his majesty's ship
_Bounty_.
We had now completed our water from an excellent spring, out of a rock
close to the water's edge, at Offaree.
King Ottoo, and his queen Edea, came on board, and were very importunate
in their solicitations to Capt. Edwards, requesting him to take them to
England with him. Aeredy, the concubine, likewise requested the same
favour; but she more generously begged they might all three go together.
But Oripai, and the other chiefs, remonstrated against his going, as they
were on the eve of a war.
We were now perfectly ready for sea; and as Capt. Cook's picture is
presented to all strangers, it is customary for navigators to write their
observations on the back of it; so our arrival and departure was notified
upon it.
The ship was filled with cocoa-nuts and fruit, as many pigs, goats, and
fowls, as the decks and boats would hold. The dismal day of our departure
now arrived. This I believe was the first time that an Englishman got up
his anchor, at the remotest part of the globe, with a heavy heart, to go
home to his own country. Every canoe almost in the island was hovering
round the ship; and they began to mourn, as is customary for the death of
a near relation. They bared their bodies, cut their heads with shells,
and smeared their breasts and shoulders with the warm blood, as it
streamed down; and as the blood ceased flowing, they renewed the wounds
in their head, attended with a dismal yell.
Ottoo now took leave of us; and, with the tears trickling down his
cheeks, begged to be remembered to King George. The tender was put in
commission, and the command of her given to Mr. Oliver the master's mate,
Mr. Renouard a midshipman, James Dodds a quartermaster; and six privates
were put on board of her. She was decked, beautifully built, and the size
of a Gravesend boat.
FOOTNOTES:
[91-1] First printed at Berwick in 1793.
[96-1] Afternoon entertainments.
[117-1] Compare the ravages of the great Lila (wasting sickness) in Fiji,
and the accounts of similar visitations following on the first visit of
an European ship to an insular people. (The Fijians, p. 243).
CHAP. II.
VOYAGE FROM OTAHEITE TO ANAMOOKA.
WITH a pleasant breeze, on the evening of the 8th of May, passed Emea or
York Island, contiguous to, and in sight of Otaheite. It is governed by
Matuara, brother-in-law to Ottoo. It is a pleasant romantic looking spot,
with very high hills upon it, and about twelve miles in circumference.
They were lately attacked by some neighbouring power, and Matuara
requested the lend of a musket from his friend and ally. When peace was
restored, Ottoo sent for his musket. Matuara represented, that as a man,
from a sense of honour, he wished to return it; but that as a king, the
love he bore his subjects prevented him complying with the request. That
single musket, and a few cartridges, gives him no small degree of
consequence, and are retained as the royal dower of his wife.
Next morning we reached Huaheine, and sent the boats on shore in Owharre
Bay. As Oedidy the chief requested to go with us to Whytutakee, he went
on shore with the officers, in their search for intelligence of the
mutineers; but they returned without success.
Here we learned the fate of Omai, the native of Otaheite, whom Captain
Cook brought from England. On his return here he had wealth enough to
obtain every fine woman on the island; and at last fell a martyr to
Venus, having finished his career by the venereal disease, two years
after his landing. His house and garden are still standing; but his
musket occasioned a war after his death, and was found in the possession
of a native of Ulitea. His servant was on board of us, but had not
retained a single article of his property.
On the 10th, we examined Ulitea and Otaha, interchanged presents with the
natives, and landed in Chamanen's Bay; but got no information.
We examined Bolobola on the 11th; and Tatahu, the king, honoured us with
a visit. The people of this island are of a more warlike disposition than
any other of the Society Islands; and on account of that national
ferocity of character, are much caressed by the Otaheitans and
neighbouring islands. They are sensible of their pre-eminence, and boast
of their country, in whatever island you meet them. They are tatooed in a
particular manner; and whether they may have spread their conquests, or
other nations imitated them, I could not learn; but a prodigious number,
in islands we afterwards visited, were tatooed in their fashion. What was
most singular, we saw some with the glans of the penis entirely tatooed;
and our men, from being tatooed in the legs, arms, and breast, places of
much less sensation, were often lame for a week, from the excruciating
torture of the operation. Tatahu likewise informed us there were no white
men on Tubai, a small island to the northward of Bolobola, and under his
jurisdiction; nor upon Mauruah, another island in sight, and to the
westward of Bolobola. He also mentioned another island, which he called
Mopehah. Here Oedidy went on shore; but getting drunk in meeting some of
his old friends, he fell asleep, and lost his passage. On the 12th we
left Mauruah, and on the 13th lost sight of the Society Islands.
Here one of the prisoners begged to speak with the Captain, and gave
information of Mr. Christian's intended rout.
We now shaped our course to fall in to the eastward of Whytutakee, an
island discovered by Capt. Bligh, and on the 19th made the island. We
sent the boat on shore, covered by the tender, to examine it; but found
it a thing impossible for the _Bounty_ to have been there; and the
natives said they had seen no white people. They were very shy, and we
could not coax them on board. One of them recollected having seen Lieut.
Hayward on board the _Bounty_. Here we purchased from the natives a spear
of most exquisite workmanship. It was nine feet long, and cut in the form
of a Gothic spire, all its ornaments being executed in a kind of alto
relievo; which, from the slow progress they made with stone tools, must
have been the labour of a man's whole life.
Here nature begins to assume a ruder aspect; and the silken bands of love
gives way to the rustic garniture of war. The natives of either sex wear
no cloathing, but a girdle of stained leaves round their middle, and the
men a gorget, of the exact shape and size as at present wore by officers
in our service. It is made of the pearl oyster-shell. The centre is
black, and the transparent part of the shell is left as an edge or border
to it, which gives it a very fine effect. It is slung round their neck
with a band of human hair, or the fibres of cocoa nut-shell, of admirable
texture, and a rose worked at each corner of the gorget, the same as the
military jemmy of the present day.
We now began to discover, that the ladies of Otaheite had left us many
warm tokens of their affection.
Instructions were given to the commander of the tender to be particular
in guarding against surprise, and a rendezvous established, in case of
separation; and on Sunday, the 22nd of May, made Palmerston's Islands.
The tender's signal was made to cover the boats in landing; and some
natives were seen rowing across the lagoon to a considerable distance.
Soon after their landing, Lieut. Corner and his party discovered a yard
and some spars marked _Bounty_, and the broad arrow upon them. When this
intelligence was communicated to the ship, a signal was made to the party
on shore to advance with great circumspection, and to guard against
surprise. Mr. Rickards, the master's mate, went in the cutter, and made a
circuit of the island.
Lieuts. Corner and Hayward landed on the different isles with
cork-jackets; but the surf running very high all round, rendered it
exceedingly dangerous, and in many places impracticable. Had they not
been expert swimmers, in duty of this kind, they must have certainly been
drowned, as they had not only themselves and the party to take care of,
but the arms and ammunition to land dry.
About four o'clock in the afternoon, Mr. Sival the midshipman came on
board in the jolly-boat, and brought with him several very curious
stained canoes, representing the figure of men, fishes, and beasts. He
had committed some mistake in the orders he was sent to execute, and was
ordered to return immediately to rectify it; but the boat did not come
back again. A few minutes after she left the ship, the weather became
thick and hazy, and began to blow fresh; so that, even with the
assistance of glasses, they could not see whether she made the shore or
not. It continued to blow during the night, so as to prevent the party on
shore from coming on board. They had been employed during the day in
searching all the islands with particular attention, having every reason
to suspect the mutineers were there, from finding the _Bounty's_ yard and
spars. But at last, wore out with fatigue in marching, and swimming
through so many reefs, and having no victuals the whole day, in the
evening they began to forage for something to eat. The gigantic cockle
was the only thing that presented. Of the shell of one they made a
kettle, to boil some junks of it in. (It may be necessary here to remark,
for the information of those who are not acquainted with it, that there
are some of them larger than three men can carry.) Of this coarse fare,
and some cocoa-nuts, they made shift, with the assistance of a good
appetite, to make a tolerable hearty supper; they then set the watch, and
went to sleep. They had thrown a large nut on the fire before they lay
down, and forgot it; but in the middle of the night, the milk of the
cocoa-nut became so expanded with the heat, that it burst with a great
explosion. Their minds had been so much engaged in the course of the day
with the enterprise they were employed in, expecting muskets to be fired
at them from every bush, that they all jumped up, seized their arms, and
were some time before they could undeceive themselves that they were
really not attacked.
In the morning the boats returned; and we were much concerned to hear
that they had seen nothing of the jolly-boat. The tender received a fresh
supply of provisions and ammunition; at the same time they had orders to
cruise in a certain direction, to look for the jolly-boat; and
Palmerston's Isles was appointed as a rendezvous to meet again. Lieut.
Corner now came on board, in a canoe not much bigger than a butcher's
tray. The cutter was sent a second time to search the reefs, but returned
without success. We then run down with the ship in the direction the wind
had blown the preceding day, in hopes of finding the boat; but after a
whole day's run to leeward, and working up again by traverses to the
isles, saw nothing of her. The tender hove in sight in the evening, and
we again searched the isles without success. All further hopes of seeing
her were given up, and we proceeded on our voyage. It may be difficult to
surmise what has been the fate of these unfortunate men. They had a
piece of salt-beef thrown into the boat to them on leaving the ship; and
it rained a good deal that night and the following day, which might
satiate their thirst. It is by these accidents the Divine Ruler of the
universe has peopled the southern hemisphere.[126-1]
Here are innumerable islands in perpetual growth. The coral, a marine
vegetable, with which the South Seas in every part abounds, is
continually shooting up from the bottom to the surface, which at first
forms lagoon islands; and the water in the centre is evaporated by the
heat of the sun, till at last a terra firma is completed. In this state
it would for ever remain a barren sand, had not Divine Providence given
birth to the cocoa-nut tree, whose fruit is so protected with a hard
shell, that after floating about for a twelve-month in the sea, it will
vegetate, take root, and grow in those salt marshes, lagoons, incipient
islands, or what you please to call them. Their roots serve to bind the
surface of the coral; and the annual shedding of their leaves, in time
creates a soil which produces a verdure or undergrowth. This affords a
favourite resting-place to sea-fowls, and the whole feathered race, who
in their dung drop the seeds of shrubs, fruits, and plants; by which
means all the variety of the vegetable kingdom is disseminated. At last
the variegated landscape rises to the view; and when the divine
Architect has finished his work, it becomes then a residence for man.
From the various accidents incident to man in the early stages of
society, their wants, and the restless spirit inherent in their natures,
they are tempted to dare the elements, either in fishing, commerce, or
war; and from their temerity are often blown to remote and uninhabited
islands. Distressing accidents of this nature often happening to
inhabitants of the South Seas, they now seldom undertake any hazardous
enterprise by water without a woman, and a sow with pig, being in the
canoe with them; by which means, if they are cast on any of those
uninhabited islands, they fix their abode.
Their remote situation from European powers has deprived them of the
culture of civilised life, as they neither serve to swell the ambitious
views of conquest, nor the avarice of commerce. Here the sacred finger of
Omnipotence has interposed, and rendered our vices the instruments of
virtue; and although that unfortunate man Christian has, in a rash
unguarded moment, been tempted to swerve from his duty to his king and
country, as he is in other respects of an amiable character and
respectable abilities, should he elude the hand of justice, it may be
hoped he will employ his talents in humanizing the rude savages; so that,
at some future period, a British Ilion may blaze forth in the south with
all the characteristic virtues of the English nation, and complete the
great prophecy, by propagating the Christian knowledge amongst the
infidels. As Christian has taken fourteen beautiful women with him from
Otaheite, there is little doubt of his intention of colonising some
undiscovered island.
On the 6th day of June, we discovered an island, which was named the Duke
of York's island. Lieuts. Corner and Hayward were sent out to examine it
in the two yauls, covered by the tender. Some huts being discovered by
the ship, a signal was immediately made for the party on shore to be on
their guard, and to advance with caution.
Soon after their arrival on shore, a ship's wooden buoy was discovered.
On searching the huts, nets of different sizes were found hanging in
them, and a variety of fishing utensils. Stages and wharfs were likewise
discovered in different parts of the creek, which led us to imagine it
was only an island resorted to in the fishing season by some neighbouring
nation. The skeleton of a very large fish, supposed to be a whale, was
found near the beach; and a place of venerable aspect, formed entirely by
the hand of Nature, and resembling a Druidical temple, commanded their
attention. The falling of a very large old tree, formed an arch, through
which the interior part of the temple was seen, which heightened the
perspective, and gave a romantic solemn dignity to the scene. At the
extreme end of the temple, three altars were placed, the centre one
higher than the other two, on which some white shells were piled in
regular order.[128-1]
After traversing the island, they returned to the huts, and hung up a few
knives, looking-glasses, and some little articles of European
manufacture, that the natives, on their return, might know the island had
been visited.
On the 12th, we discovered another island, which was named the Duke of
Clarence's island. In running along the land, we saw several canoes
crossing the lagoons. The tender's signal was made, to cover the boats in
landing, and Lieuts. Corner and Hayward sent to reconnoitre the beach, to
discover a landing-place. In this duty they came pretty near some of the
natives in their canoes, who made signs of peace to them; but, either
from fear or business, avoided having any intercourse with us. Morais,
or burying-places, were likewise found here, which indicated it to be a
principal residence. Here they find some old cocoa trees hollowed
longitudinally, as tanks or reservoirs for the rain water.
On the 18th, we discovered an island of more considerable extent than any
island that has hitherto been discovered in the south; and as there were
many collateral circumstances which might hereafter promise it to be a
discovery of national importance, in honour of the first lord of the
admiralty, it was called Chatham's Island. It is beautifully diversified
with hills and dales, of twice the extent of Otaheite, and a hardy
warlike race of people. The natives described a large river to us, which
disembogued itself into a spacious bay, that promises excellent
anchorage.[129-1] Here we learned the death of Fenow, king of Anamooka,
from one of his family of the same name, who had a finger cut off in
mourning for him. After trading a whole day with the natives, who seemed
fair and honourable in their dealings, we examined it without success,
and proceeded on our voyage.
On the 21st we discovered a very considerable island, of about forty
miles long. It was named by the natives Otutuelah. Capt. Edwards gave no
name to it; but should posterity derive the advantages from it which it
at present promises, I presume it may hereafter be called Edwards's
island.[129-2]
It is well wooded with immense large trees, whose foliage spreads like
the oak; and there is a deal of shrubbery on it, bearing a yellow flower.
The natives are remarkably handsome. Some of them had their skins tinged
with yellow, as a mark of distinction, which at first led us to imagine
they were diseased. Neither sex wear any cloathing but a girdle of
leaves round their middle, stained with different colours. The women
adorn their hair with chaplets of sweet-smelling flowers and bracelets,
and necklaces of flowers round their wrists and neck.
On their first coming on board, they trembled for fear. They were
perfectly ignorant of fire-arms, never having seen a European ship
before. They made many gestures of submission, and were struck with
wonder and surprise at every thing they saw. Amongst other things, they
brought us some most remarkable fine puddings, which abounded with
aromatic spiceries, that excelled in taste and flavour the most delicate
seed-cake. As we have never hitherto known of spices or aromatics being
in the South Seas, it is certainly a matter worthy the investigation of
some future circumnavigators. We traded with them the whole day, and got
many curiosities. Birds and fowls, of the most splendid plumage, were
brought on board, some resembling the peacock, and a great variety of the
parrot kind.
One woman amongst many others came on board. She was six feet high, of
exquisite beauty, and exact symmetry, being naked, and unconscious of her
being so, added a lustre to her charms; for, in the words of the poet,
"She needed not the foreign ornaments of dress; careless of beauty, she
was beauty's self."
Many mouths were watering for her; but Capt. Edwards, with great humanity
and prudence, had given previous orders, that no woman should be
permitted to go below, as our health had not quite recovered the shock it
received at Otaheite; and the lady was obliged to be contented with
viewing the great cabin, where she was shewn the wonders of the Lord on
the face of the mighty deep. Before evening, the women went all on shore,
and the men began to be troublesome and pilfering. The third lieutenant
had a new coat stole out of his cabin; and they were making off with
every bit of iron they could lay hands on.
It now came on to blow fresh, and we were obliged to make off from the
land. Those who were engaged in trade on board were so anxious, that we
had got almost out of sight of their canoes before they perceived the
ship's motion, when they all jumped into the water like a flock of wild
geese; but one fellow, more earnest than the rest, hung by the rudder
chains for a mile or two, thinking to detain her.
This evening, at five o'clock, we unfortunately parted company, and lost
sight of our tender. False fires were burnt, and great guns and small
arms were fired without success, as it came on thick blowing weather.
We cruised for her all the 23rd and 24th, near where we parted company,
which was off a piece of remarkable high land. What was most unfortunate,
water and provisions were then on deck for her, which were intended to
have been put on board of her in the morning. She had the day before
received orders, in case of separation, to rendezvous at Anamooka, and to
wait there for us. A small cag of salt, and another of nails and
iron-ware, were likewise put on board of her, to traffic with the
Indians, and the latitudes and longitudes of the places we would touch
at, in our intended rout. She had a boarding netting fixed, to prevent
her being boarded, and several seven-barrelled pieces and blunderbusses
put on board of her.
As we proceeded to the eastward, we saw another island, which we knew to
be one of the navigator's isles, discovered by Mons. Bougainville. On the
28th, in the morning, saw the Happai Islands, discovered by Capt. Cook,
and before noon, the group of islands to the eastward of Anamooka, and
sailed down between Little Anamooka and the Fallafagee Island.
On the 29th, we anchored in the road of Anamooka. Immediately on our
arrival, a large sailing canoe was hired, and Lieut. Hayward and one
private sent to the Happai and Feegee Islands,[132-1] to make inquiry
after the _Bounty_ and our tender; but received no intelligence. Here
they found an axe, which had been left by Capt. Cook, and bartered with
the natives of the different islands for hogs, yams, &c.