Page:Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks.djvu/258

200 more than one or two houses, others twelve or fourteen. Every one of these was enclosed by its own palisade, though not so high and strong as the general one; in these were vast heaps of dried fish and fern roots piled up, so much so that if they had had water, I should have thought them well prepared for a siege, but that had to be fetched from a brook below; so that they probably do not besiege a town as we do in Europe. Without the fence were many houses and large nets, the latter, I suppose, being brought in upon any alarm; there was also about half an acre planted with gourds and sweet potatoes, the only cultivation we have seen in this bay.

14th. As we were resolved to stay no longer here, we all went ashore, the boats to get as much celery and oysters as possible, Dr. Solander and myself to get as many green plants as possible, in order to finish the sketches, etc., while at sea; so an enormous number of all these articles came on board.

Dr. Solander, who was to-day in a cove different from that I was in, saw the natives catch many lobsters in a very simple manner; they walked among the rocks at low water, about waist-deep in water, and moved their feet about till they felt one, on which they dived down, and constantly brought him up. I do not know whether I have before mentioned these lobsters, but we have had them in tolerable plenty in almost every place we have been in, and they are certainly the largest and best I have ever eaten.

20th. We had yesterday resolved to employ this day in examining a bay we saw, so at daybreak we set out in the boats. A fresh breeze of wind soon carried us to the bottom of the bay, where we found a very fine river, broad as the Thames at Greenwich, though not quite so deep; there was, however, water enough for vessels of more than a middling size, and a bottom of mud so soft that nothing could possibly take damage by running ashore.

About a mile up this was an Indian town built upon a small bank of dry sand, but totally surrounded by deep mud, so much so that I believe they had purposely built it there as a defence. The people came out in flocks upon the banks,