serious mood, and trade went on with great regularity.  At length, when the cabin and gun-room had got as much as they wanted, the men were allowed to come to the gangway, and trade for themselves.  Unhappily the same care was not taken to prevent frauds as had been taken before, so that the Indians, finding that they could cheat with impunity, grew insolent again, and proceeded to take greater liberties.  One of the canoes, having sold every thing on board, pulled forward, and the people that were in her seeing some linen hang over the ship’s side to dry, one of them, without any ceremony, untied it, and put it up in his bundle:  He was immediately called to, and required to return it; instead of which, he let his canoe drop astern, and laughed at us:  A musket was fired over his head, which, did not put a stop to his mirth; another was then fired at him with small shot, which struck him upon the back; he, shrunk a little when the shot hit him, but did not regard it more than one of our men would have done the stroke of a rattan:  He continued with great composure to pack up the linen that he had stolen.  All the canoes now dropped astern about a hundred yards, and all set up their song of defiance, which they continued till the ship was distant from them about four hundred yards.  As they seemed to have no design to attack us, I was not willing to do them any hurt; yet I thought their going off in a bravado might have a bad effect when it should be reported ashore.  To show them therefore that they were still in our power, though very much beyond the reach of any missile weapon with which they were acquainted, I gave the ship a yaw, and fired a four-pounder so as to pass near them.  The shot happened to strike the water, and rise several times at a great distance beyond the canoes; This struck them with terror, and they paddled away without once looking behind them.

About two in the afternoon, we saw a pretty high island bearing west from us; and at five, saw more islands and rocks to the westward of that.  We hauled our wind in order to go without them, but could not weather them before it was dark.  I therefore bore up, and ran between them and the main.  At seven, I was close under the first, from which a large double canoe, or rather two canoes lashed together at the distance of about a foot, and covered with boards so as to make a deck, put off, and made sail for the ship:  This was the first vessel of the kind that we had seen since we left the South Sea islands.  When she came near, the people on board entered very freely into conversation with Tupia, and, we thought, showed a friendly disposition; but when it was just dark, they ran their canoe close to the ship’s side, and threw in a volley of stones, after which they paddled ashore.

We learnt from Tupia, that the people in the canoe called the island which we were under Mowtohora; it is but of a small circuit, though high, and lies six miles from the main; on the south side is anchorage in fourteen fathom water.  Upon the main land, S.W. by W. of this island, and apparently at no great distance from the sea, is a high round mountain, which I called Mount Edgecumbe:  it stands in the middle of a large plain, and is therefore the more conspicuous; latitude 37 deg. 59’, longitude 183 deg. 7’.