Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/371

] them as much as the best rhenish wine. Surely they were not aware of our repugnance to such a beverage; yet they might have supposed that, in a torrid climate, and after a long privation of fresh provisions, we would not be very fond of swallowing salt water.

The General proposed to introduce us to the members of the Council also, to which we readily assented; and they gave us a very kind reception.

10th. As we intended to remain at Amboyna, for a month at the least, I had conveyed to the place where we were to lodge, many things necessary for the preparation of the different productions, which I intended to collect in the island. The other naturalists and I had agreed to live in the same house. It was already prepared for our reception, and our things had been carried into it, when, to our great astonishment, we found it occupied by some officers from the two ships, who, however, knew very well that we had taken the house; but the man who had the key thought that they belonged to our party. The gentlemen made themselves very merry with this pitiful trick, of which we did not think them capable; but it was easy for us to find other lodgings.

Our apprehensions respecting the cabin-boy, who had disappeared three days before, were but too