Corporal Coles being now nearly recovered I left the rest of the party under Mr. Lushington to follow the plan of refreshing themselves by immersion in the sea and, as two men appeared to me to be very ill, I arranged with him that he should keep the whole together and, as soon as he considered them sufficiently recovered, they should follow myself and Coles; whilst we preceded them along the beach for the purpose of sending a boat back from the Lynher to pick them up.

Further course obstructed.

I accordingly started with Coles and had not proceeded more than a mile when we found two huts (one in ruins and the other complete) of exactly the same size and form as that which we had seen in the morning:  the recent track of a native along the beach close to these was also visible.  In another half mile our progress was arrested by an arm of the sea, about four or five hundred yards across, from which the tide was running out with fearful rapidity; and on the opposite cliffs we observed a native watching our movements.

As night was coming rapidly on it was necessary for me to decide at once what I should do.  Coles was unable to swim.  If therefore I crossed the stream it must be alone:  to do so with natives on the opposite bank, of whose intentions towards us we were entirely ignorant, was not without considerable danger; yet I was very unwilling to leave the men in such a state of suffering from thirst when I was so near the schooner, from whence their wants could be supplied.  Whilst I was debating what to do Coles kept firing his gun in hopes that they might hear the report on board and send a boat to our relief; in vain however we strained our ears, the report of Coles’s gun was reverberated from cliff to cliff and from hill to hill, but no answering sound came back across the tranquil water.

In the meantime I felt more and more anxious about the portion of the party who were with Mr. Lushington, having left with them certain orders and promised to send a boat up to them; on which promise all their further movements would be regulated.  The beach near us afforded no wood wherewith to make a fire as a signal to the schooner; the cliffs hereabouts were too precipitous to climb; and it was evident that but very few of the party could swim so broad a space of water; granting that they ever reached so far as the point where Coles and myself now were.

Swim an inlet of the sea.  Danger in the passage across and after landing.

I therefore determined to run all risks, and swim the arm of the sea which stopped our way.

I directed Coles to wait until the others came up and then to remain with them until I returned in a boat.  From the rugged nature of the shore I could not have walked a yard without shoes, so I kept them on, as well as my shirt and military cap, and I took a pistol in one hand as a means of defence against the natives, or else to fire it when I reached a spot where it could be seen or heard from the vessel.