Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/189

] score paces, when, finding himself briskly and closely pursued, he placed himself behind a tree, round which he turned several times, to avoid being caught. Our companion, however, laid held of his clothes, and fancied himself on the point of recovering his pincers, as he imagined he had the thief fast: but what was his surprise, when the other loosened his girdle, and left his clothes behind him, to escape with the article he had stolen!

We soon got into the fields, where we saw the property of each individual divided into small enclosures, surrounded by palisades, and completely cultivated. The Indian cole, arum esculentum, grew there vigorously among many other vegetables, which I have already mentioned, and which equally with it are used as food by the natives. The sugar-canes we saw there, were planted at a pretty considerable distance from each other, under the shade of the inocarpus edulis, the fruit of which these people roast and eat, its flavour much resembling that of the chesnut. In the same enclosure, we saw several of the orange-leaved Indian mulberry trees (morinda citrifolia), loaded with ripe fruit, which is much esteemed by the natives. They brought us a great quantity of this fruit for a few days when we first an-