Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/246

180 elbow; he immediately turned about, and discovering the man who discharged it, levelled his musket, on the impulse of the moment, and shot him dead upon the spot: instantly the enemy sounded the war-whoop, and all was uproar and confusion. The king, not understanding the cause, was in a most violent rage with Mr. Mariner, and would forthwith have dispatched him with his club, had he been near enough: his matabooles did all they could to calm his temper, but he was not easily pacified: he sent a man to Mr. Mariner to demand his musket, but the latter, feeling himself aggrieved, peremptorily refused: Finow, by this time, becoming somewhat more calm, and learning the true cause of the disaster, was speedily reconciled. In the mean time the enemy, conceiving this to be a piece of treachery, returned to their entrenchments, and assailed the besiegers with showers of arrows. The king now ordered the great guns to open a fire upon the fort, but they seemed to do little or no injury to the works, owing to the height of the place and the strength of the embankment; several, however, were killed who ventured outside of it. The firing had lasted, with occasional intermissions, during six or seven hours, when a considerable number of the enemy were perceived coming out of the fencing, and sheltering