Page:Captain Cook's Journal during His First Voyage Round the World.djvu/28

xxii some of the Paumotu Group, and finally discovered Tahiti, where she anchored at Royal Bay, after grounding on a reef at its entrance, with her people, as usual, decimated by scurvy. They were almost immediately attacked by the natives, who, however, received such a reception that they speedily made friends, and fast friends too. The remainder of the month of the Dolphin stay was marked with the most friendly intercourse, and she sailed with a high opinion of Tahiti and the Tahitians; the Queen, Cook's Obereia, being especially well disposed to them. Their communication with the natives must, however, have been limited, as they remained too short a time to learn the language, and we gather little of the manners and customs from the account of the voyage.

After sailing from Tahiti we hear the same tale—sickness, want of water, doubt of what was before them. After sailing by several small islands, and an attempt to water at one, course was steered as before for the Ladrones. Let Wallis tell his own story. He says:—

"I considered that watering here would be tedious and attended with great fatigue; that it was now the depth of winter in the southern hemisphere; that the ship was leaky, that the rudder shook in the stern very much, and that what other damage she might have received in her bottom could not be known. That for these reasons she was very unfit for the bad weather which she would certainly meet with, either in going round C. Horn or through the Streight of Magellan; that if she should get safely through the streight or round the Cape, it would be absolutely necessary to refresh in some port; but in that case no port would be in her reach. I therefore determined to make the best of my way to Tinian, Batavia, and so to Europe by the Cape of Good Hope.

"By this rout, as far as we could judge, we should sooner be at home; and if the ship should prove not to be in a condition to make the whole voyage, we should still save our lives, as from this place to Batavia we should probably have a calm sea, and be not far from a port."

These are scarcely the sentiments of a bold explorer, and we shall look in vain for any similar ideas on the part of Cook. Here was a ship just a year from England, just come from a convenient and friendly island, where every refreshment and opportunity for refit were to be found, and the only thought is how to get home again!

It was the vastly different conduct of Cook's voyages; the determination that nothing should stop the main object of the expedition; his resource in every difficulty and danger; that