A day or two after, Banks received an urgent message from his friend Taburai (Lycurgus), saying he was very ill.  He complained of having been poisoned by one of the sailors.  It seems he had noticed the sailors chewing, and had ask for a quid, had bitten off a piece and swallowed it.  Banks prescribed large draughts of coconut milk, with happy results.

Surf riding.

Flies were a terrible pest; they got into everything, and ate off the artist’s colours almost as fast as they were laid on.  Tar and molasses was tried as a trap for them, but the natives stole it and used it as ointment for sores.  The surf-riding struck the visitors with admiration.  Swimming out with a piece of board they would mount it, and come in on the crests of the waves; and Banks says he does not believe that any European could have lived amongst the breakers as they did; he especially admired the manner they timed the waves and dived beneath on their way out from shore.

A blacksmith’s forge had been set up, and in spare time the smith would fashion old iron into axes or repair old axes for the natives; and it was noticed that some of these old axes were not of English make, and it appeared unlikely they were obtained from the Dolphin.  At length it was ascertained that since Wallis’s visit in that vessel, two ships had anchored off the east coast, and it was concluded from the description given by the natives of the flags that they were Spanish, but on the arrival of the Endeavour at Batavia they were able to identify them as the French ships commanded by M. de Bougainville, whose crews were suffering very severely from scurvy at the time.

Paying a visit to Dootahah to see if a supply of fresh meat, which was running very short, could be obtained, they were received in a very friendly manner, but being delayed till it was too late to return to the ship by daylight, they remained all night, and as a consequence nearly every one found they had lost some property; Cook’s stockings were stolen from under his pillow, where he had placed them for safety.  Perhaps as consolation for their losses they were entertained during the night to a concert.  Three drums and four flutes, the latter having four holes into one of which the performer blew with his nostrils, were the orchestra, and Cook’s criticism is hardly complimentary:  “The music and singing were so much of a piece that I was very glad when it was over.”  They waited till noon the next day in hopes of meat and the return of the stolen articles, but in vain, though Dootahah promised he would bring all to the ship—­“a promise we had no reason to expect he would fulfil.”

The transit of Venus.