Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/342

314 is about twenty feet in height. The wind acts strongly upon so lofty a sail, and gives to those canoes an impulse, which makes them plough the water with astonishing rapidity.

When this swift motion is not required, they only hoist about five feet of one side of their sail in a horizontal position, while the rest of it lies on the canoe. But in this way they can only sail right before the wind.

Their paddles are very broad, and are furnished with a handle six feet and a half in length. They use them as our sailors do their oars; for they act like levers, whose point of support is on one side of the canoe. The steersman is stationed in the stern, and directs the canoe with his paddle.

After lying to till half past ten in the morning, we continued to follow the coast in a westerly direction. It is every where bordered with islands connected together by reefs. We observed, beyond those reefs, several fishing places, constructed with stakes fixed in the bottom, at a certain distance from the beach, and which resembled those which we afterwards saw in the Moluccas.

As soon as we set sail, the canoes followed our example, in order to accompany us. We admired the celerity with which that flotilla clave the waters. Although we had a very fresh breeze, and