On the 18th, at day-break, I went on shore, with as many people as could possibly be spared from the ship, and began to erect our fort.  While some were employed in throwing up intrenchments, others were busy in cutting pickets and fascines, which the natives, who soon gathered round us as they had been used to do, were so far from hindering, that many of them voluntarily assisted us, bringing the pickets and fascines from the wood where they had been cut, with great alacrity:  We had indeed been so scrupulous of invading their property, that we purchased every stake which was used upon this occasion, and cut down no tree till we had first obtained their consent.  The soil where we constructed our fort was sandy, and this made it necessary to strengthen the entrenchments with wood; three sides were to be fortified in this manner; the fourth was bounded by a river, upon the banks of which I proposed to place a proper number of water-casks.  This day we served pork to the ship’s company for the first time, and the Indians brought down so much bread-fruit and cocoa-nuts, that we found it necessary to send away part of them unbought, and to acquaint them, by signs, that we should want no more for two days to come.  Every thing was purchased this day with beads:  A single bead, as big as a pea, being the purchase of five or six cocoa-nuts, and as many of the bread-fruit.  Mr Banks’s tent was got up before night within the works, and he slept on shore for the first time.  Proper centries were placed round it, but no Indian attempted to approach it the whole night.

The next morning, our friend Tubourai Tamaide made Mr Banks a visit, at the tent, and brought with him not only his wife and family, but the roof of a house, and several materials for setting it up, with furniture and implements of various kinds, intending, as we understood him, to take up his residence in our neighbourhood:  This instance of his confidence and good-will gave us great pleasure, and we determined to strengthen his attachment to us by every means in our power.  Soon after his arrival he took Mr Banks by the hand, and leading him out of the line, signified that he should accompany him into the woods.  Mr Banks readily consented, and having walked with him about a quarter of a mile, they arrived at a kind of awning which he had already set up, and which seemed to be his occasional habitation.  Here he unfolded a bundle of his country cloth, and taking out two garments, one of red cloth, and the other of very neat matting, he clothed Mr Banks in them, and without any other ceremony immediately conducted him back to the tent.  His attendants soon after brought him some pork and bread-fruit, which he eat, dipping his meat into salt water instead of sauce:  After his meal he retired to Mr Banks’s bed, and slept about an hour.  In the afternoon, his wife Tomio brought to the tent a young man about two-and-twenty years of age, of a very comely appearance, whom they both seemed to acknowledge as their son, though we afterwards discovered that he was not so.  In the evening, this young man and another chief, who had also paid us a visit, went away to the westward, but Tubourai Tamaide and his wife returned to the awning in the skirts of the wood.