and then return to me, repeating signs to haul the boat up, and hesitating a good deal before he would receive some spike-nails, which I then offered him.  This made me suspect something was intended, and immediately I stepped into the boat, telling them by signs that I should soon return.  But they were not for parting so soon, and now attempted by force, what they could not obtain by gentler means.  The gang-board happened unluckily to be laid out for me to come into the boat, I say unluckily, for if it had not been out, and if the crew had been a little quicker in getting the boat off, the natives might not have had time to put their design in execution, nor would the following disagreeable scene have happened.  As we were putting off the boat, they laid hold of the gang-board, and unhooked it off the boat’s stern.  But as they did not take it away, I thought this had been done by accident, and ordered the boat in again to take it up.  Then they themselves hooked it over the boat’s stern, and attempted to haul her ashore; others, at the same time, snatched the oars out of the people’s hands.  On my pointing a musket at them, they in some measure desisted, but returned in an instant, seemingly determined to haul the boat ashore.  At the head of this party was the chief; the others, who could not come at the boat, stood behind with darts, stones, and bows and arrows in hand, ready to support them.  Signs and threats having no effect, our own safety became the only consideration; and yet I was unwilling to fire on the multitude, and resolved to make the chief alone fall a victim to his own treachery; but my musket at this critical moment missed fire.  Whatever idea they might have formed of the arms we held in our hands, they must now have looked upon them as childish weapons, and began to let us see how much better theirs were, by throwing stones and darts, and by shooting arrows.  This made it absolutely necessary for me to give orders to fire.  The first discharge threw them into confusion; but a second was hardly sufficient to drive them off the beach; and after all, they continued to throw stones from behind the trees and bushes, and, every now and then, to pop out and throw a dart.  Four lay, to all appearance, dead on the shore; but two of them afterwards crawled into the bushes.  Happy it was for these people, that not half our muskets would go off, otherwise many more must have fallen.  We had one man wounded in the cheek with a dart, the point of which was as thick as my finger, and yet it entered above two inches, which shews that it must have come with great force, though indeed we were very near them.  An arrow struck Mr Gilbert’s naked breast, who was about thirty yards off; but probably it had struck something before; for it hardly penetrated the skin.  The arrows were pointed with hard wood.

As soon as we got on board, I ordered the anchor to be weighed, with a view of anchoring near the landing-place.  While this was doing, several people appeared on the low rock point, displaying two oars we had lost in the scuffle.  I looked on this as a sign of submission, and of their wanting to give us the oars.  I was, nevertheless, prevailed on to fire a four-pound shot at them, to let them see the effect of our great guns.  The ball fell short, but frightened them so much, that none were seen afterwards; and they left the oars standing up against the bushes.