We now stood off and on; and as soon as the ships were in a proper station, about ten o’clock I ordered two boats, one of them from the Discovery, to sound the coast, and to endeavour to find a landing-place.  With this view, I went in one of them myself, taking with me such articles to give the natives, as I thought might serve to gain their good-will.  I had no sooner put off from the ship, than the canoe, with the two men, which had left us not long before, paddled toward my boat; and, having come along-side, Mourooa stept into her, without being asked, and without a moment’s hesitation.

Omai, who was with me, was ordered to enquire of him where we could land; and he directed us to two different places.  But I saw, with regret, that the attempt could not be made at either place, unless at the risk of having our boats filled with water, or even staved to pieces.  Nor were we more fortunate in our search for anchorage; for we could find no bottom, till within a cable’s length of the breakers.  There we met with from forty to twenty fathoms depth, over sharp coral rocks; so that anchoring would have been attended with much more danger than landing.

While we were thus employed in reconnoitring the shore, great numbers of the natives thronged down upon the reef, all armed as above mentioned.  Mourooa, who was now in my boat, probably thinking that this warlike appearance hindered us from landing, ordered them to retire back.  As many of them complied, I judged he must be a person of some consequence among them.  Indeed, if we understood him right, he was the king’s brother.  So great was the curiosity of several of them, that they took to the water, and, swimming off to the boats, came on board them without reserve.  Nay, we found it difficult to keep them out; and still more difficult to prevent their carrying off every thing they could lay their hands upon.  At length, when they perceived that we were returning to the ships, they all left us, except our original visitor Mourooa.  He, though not without evident signs of fear, kept his place in my boat, and accompanied me on board the ship.

The cattle, and other new objects, that presented themselves to him there, did not strike him with so much surprise as one might have expected.  Perhaps his mind was too much taken up about his own safety, to allow him to attend to other things.  It is certain, that he seemed very uneasy; and the ship, on our getting on board, happening to be standing off shore, this circumstance made him the more so.  I could get but little new information from him; and therefore, after he had made a short stay, I ordered a boat to carry him in toward the land.  As soon as he got out of the cabin, he happened to stumble over one of the goats.  His curiosity now overcoming his fear, he stopped, looked at it, and asked Omai, what bird this was? and not receiving an immediate answer from him, he repeated the question to some of the people upon deck.  The boat having conveyed him pretty near to the surf, he leaped into the sea, and swam ashore.  He had no sooner landed, than the multitude of his countrymen gathered round him, as if with an eager curiosity to learn from him what he had seen; and in this situation they remained, when we lost sight of them.  As soon as the boat returned, we hoisted her in, and made sail from the land to the northward.