Page:Twenty years before the mast - Charles Erskine, 1896.djvu/259

 would turn one hand over the other with great rapidity. Some time after we found the meaning of the first three words to be, "Give us some tobacco"; the next was  "Nisqually"; the other words meant a Mr. Wilson, a  missionary from Boston. The motion of the hands was to describe a small stern-wheel boat at Nisqually, belonging to the Hudson Bay Company. After giving the Indians some tobacco we put to sea.

The morning of the 30th was still foggy. We saw a great abundance of wild geese and ducks flying in almost  every direction and appearing very tame, probably having never heard the report of a gun. We captured many of them with little trouble.

During the night, which was very dark and rainy, the ship was hove to, a cast of the lead being taken every  fifteen minutes. The morning of the first of May proved to be fair and beautiful. With a light sea-breeze we doubled Cape Flattery and entered the Straits of  Juan de Fuca. While beating up the straits we were boarded by many canoes. At nine o’clock on the 2d we made Port Discovery. We came to anchor close in shore, in twenty fathoms of water. While surveying this place we came in contact with many of the Indians, who,  in their broken language, would ask if we were Boston  or King George ships. There was a great difference between the islanders of the Pacific and these Indians,  both in language and appearance. They seemed to have scarcely any idea of decency or cleanliness, and seemed  to be almost as low in the scale of humanity as the  Terra del Fuegians.

It was indeed amusing to observe the contempt that