Chapter 492

In the afternoon the two captains landed, to examine the watering place, which they found very convenient. During their absence a crowd of natives came on board, and amply confirmed the unenviable reputation they had acquired in the earlier records of Bougainville and Cook.

"One of the officers, standing on the quarter-deck," says the narrative, "desiring to give a child six years old, in one of the pirogues, some glass beads, let them fall into the sea. The child at once jumped into the water and dived until he recovered them. To reward his skill, he threw other trifles to him, a generosity which tempted a crowd of men and women, who amused us by their surprising agility in the waves. Their easy attitudes in the water, and the suppleness of their limbs, made them like amphibious animals."

B……