Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/287

] cloth a human scull that was suspended over another tomb, the coronal bone of which was fractured on the left side. They informed us, that the warrior it belonged to had been killed in battle by a club.

Next morning early, twenty of us set off with an intention to cross the mountains, and from thence to descend into the extensive valley, where, in one of our excursions, we had descried at a great distance a considerable number of cultivated fields. It was probable that we should there meet with a great number of inhabitants, but we were sufficiently well armed to be able to repel any attack which they might venture to make.

At first we followed the coast, advancing towards the west, and penetrating from time to time into the woods, we saw a number of inhabitants quit their huts, and leave behind them a net which they had spread out to dry. It appeared that that implement of fishing is very rare amongst these savages: its common size is about eight yards in length, and eighteen inches in breadth. They shewed us but very few of them during our whole stay in the Island, and no price could tempt any of them to part with one.

We perceived near this place a great quantity of broken shells of fish, which had served the