This day Mr Wales, and two or three of the officers advanced a little, for the first time, into the island.  They met with a small straggling village, the inhabitants of which treated them with great civility; and the next morning Mr Forster and his party made another excursion inland.  They met with several fine plantations of plantains, sugar-canes, yams, &C.; and the natives were courteous and civil.  Indeed, by this time, the people, especially those in our neighbourhood, were so well reconciled to us, that they shewed not the least dislike at our rambling about in the skirts of the woods, shooting, &c.  In the afternoon some boys having got behind thickets, and having thrown two or three stones at our people who were cutting wood, they were fired at by the petty officers present on duty.  Being ashore at that time, I was alarmed at hearing the report of the musquets, and seeing two or three boys run out of the wood.  When I knew the cause I was much displeased at so wanton an use being made of our fire-arms, and took measures to prevent it for the future.  Wind southerly, with heavy showers of rain.[5]

During the night, and also all the 11th, the volcano was exceedingly troublesome, and made a terrible noise, throwing up prodigious columns of fire and smoke at each explosion, which happened every three or four minutes; and, at one time, great stones were seen high in the air.  Besides the necessary work of wooding and watering, we struck the main-top-mast to fix new trestle-trees and back-stays.  Mr Forster and his party went up the hill on the west side of the harbour, where he found three places from whence smoke of a sulphureous smell issued, through cracks and fissures in the earth.  The ground about these was exceedingly hot, and parched or burnt, and they seemed to keep pace with the volcano; for, at every explosion of the latter, the quantity of smoke or steam in these was greatly increased, and forced out so as to rise in small columns, which we saw from the ship, and had taken for common fires made by the natives.  At the foot of this hill are the hot-springs before mentioned.

In the afternoon, Mr Forster having begun his botanical researches on the other side of the harbour, fell in with our friend Paowang’s house, where he saw most of the articles I had given him, hanging on the adjoining trees and bushes, as if they were not worthy of being under his roof.

On the 12th, some of the officers accompanied Mr Forster to the hot places he had been at the preceding day.  A thermometer placed in a little hole made in one of them, rose from 80, at which it stood in the open air, to 170.  Several other parts of the hill emitted smoke or steam all the day, and the volcano was unusually furious, insomuch that the air was loaded with its ashes.  The rain which fell at this time was a compound of water, sand, and earth; so that it properly might be called showers of mire.  Whichever way the wind was, we were plagued with the