6 off Cape Invarion on the Island of Santa
Cruz of the Santa Cruz group these with
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| Tinakula (NASA picture linked from Wikipedia) |
a lot more islands are called the Queen Charlotte
Group, our purpose being to annex them and all
the Islands round about,and pace them un-
der British Protection hoisting the British Flag
on each we lay off a village and sent a boat
in for the purpose of bringing off an English
man (Forrest?) which had great scope with the
natives, but they found out from a canoe when
near in shore that he did not live there, so
they took the oldest man out of the canoe and
let the others go, they brought him on board,
and turn him over to the Captain who took
him on the bridge and made him by signs
and gesture paint out in what direction
the trader lived after a little trouble they
managed to make him understand what
was wanted, we then proceeded a few
miles along the coast to the place of the
trader, Rosia Granville, stopped off there
the trader came on board and was with
the Captain three or four hours, he then went
on shore again and returned shortly after fully
equipped for a Sea Voyage having two na-
tives as body servants with him, his business was
to act as interpreter and to point out all the
largest villages on the Islands and the best
way of approaching them in fact a kind of a
pilot in every thing we proceeded further
along the coast till we came to Graciosa Bay
we went inside and anchored fro the night.
We had look outs stationed all round the ship
in case of surprise, as the natives so we was
warned might make a dash on us during
the night mistaking us for a Merchant-
man instead of a Man of War, the Natives
of these Islands are very much different to
the Solomon Islands, they are very finely
made, and of a dark copper colour through
there nose they wear a thick tortoise
shell ring about 1 2/2 inch in diameter in their
ears they have a collection of Tortoise and Sea Shell
rings,one had at least thirty of these rings
in his ears and must have weighed as much
as 1/2 ib the lobes of the ear were stretched to
an enormous size, I noticed that some of
them had got their ornaments tied round
their ears on account of their lobe having
been torn away, no doubt through a-
mount that he had got in them, there was
a great crowd of them collected about the ship
and after time they came alongside in their
canoes a very fine and neatly made grass
mat was their only article of clothing passed
round their loins then between the legs and
tucked n before and behind in the same man-
ner as the natives of the Florida Group, they
wore large shell rings around the upper arm
and some had a large shell breast plate with
some sort of design made out of tortoise
shell hung round their necks, but most
conspicuous of all was their large red Wooden
Bows and from a dozen to twenty long and
highly ornamented poisonous arrows, their
canoes were laden up fully with Native
produce and sheaves of theses arrows, which
are certainly the most terrible and deadly
weapons we came acroos, they are not
feathered like those they use for archery
in England but are made of a simple
cane shaft four or five feet long and carved
with some care the designs upon them
being coloured with Red & white kind of
stain, the points are long and thin and of a
light brown colour the tips being made of human
bone, the canoes of these islands are not made
out of a single log as most of the islands in
the pacific are, but are partly built, they have
got the usual outrigger but in addition
they have a counterbalancing platform
on the other side on which they carry bun-
dles of arrows, Coca Nuts, Bread Fruit & other
native produce which they use for bar-
tering with, the way they handle the canoes
is something remarkable, there were several
of them upset in their eagerness to get along
side, but the owners swimming up to them
would in less than no time with a swing-
ing motion shake a good deal of the water
out, they would then jump in and commence
bailing out with the greatest ease, all their
trading stuff being fastened with coarse
native rope made from the fibre of Coca nuts,
A few of the natives were allowed on board at
a time , they started trading in Bows & Arrows
Shells, Yams, and different native trinkets
taking in return Coloured Calico, Sticks of
Tobacco, Pipes or any little thing that would
catch their eye, things that you would
throw away on the scrap heap at home,
Our tunic buttons and Cap ornaments
where in great demand, you could get
a Native Canoe Wife and all his family
if you would give a chief one of our Brass
Front Plates of our Helmet, on the whole
they were a very savage and ferocious
lot and could not be trusted.
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