Page:Early voyages to Terra Australis.djvu/260

 food at all. There is neither herb, root, pulse, nor any sort of grain for them to eat that we saw; nor any sort of bird or beast that they can catch, having no instruments where-withal to do so.

I did not perceive that they did worship anything. These poor creatures have a sort of weapon to defend their ware or fight with their enemies, if they have any that will interfere with their poor fishery. They did endeavour with their weapons to frighten us, who, lying ashore, deterr'd them from one of their fishing places. Some of them had wooden swords, others had a sort of lances. The sword is a piece of wood, shaped somewhat like a cutlass. The lance is a long strait pole, sharp at one end, and hardened afterwards by heat. I saw no iron, nor any other sort of metal; therefore it is probable they use stone hatchets, as some Indians in America do, described in chapter iv.

How they get their fire I know not, but probably, as Indians do, out of wood. I have seen the Indians of Bon-Airy do it, and have myself tryed the experiment. They take a flat piece of wood, that is pretty soft, and make a small dent in one side of it; then they take another hard round stick, about the bigness of one's little finger, and sharpening it at one end like a pencil, they put that sharp end in the hole or dent of the flat soft juice, and then rubbing or twirling the hard piece between the palms of their hands, they drill the soft piece till it smokes, and at last takes fire.

These people speak somewhat through the throat, but we could not understand one word that they said. We anchored, as I said before, January the 5th, and seeing men walking on the shore, we presently set a canoe to get some acquaintance with them, for we were in hopes to get some provisions among them. But the inhabitants, seeing our boat coming, run away and hid themselves. We searched afterwards three days, in hopes to find their houses; but