Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/81

] When we returned toward Port Dentrecasteaux, most of the savages accompanied us; and before they left us, they gave us to understand, that, in two days, by proceeding along the shore, they should be very near our ships. To inform us that they should make this journey in two days, they pointed out with their hands the diurnal motion of the sun, and expressed the number two by as many of their fingers.

When we re-embarked to go on board, these good people followed us with their eyes for some time, before they left the shore, and then they disappeared in the woods. Their way brought them at times to the shore again, of which we were immediately informed by the cries of joy, with which they made the air resound. These testimonies of pleasure did not cease till we lost sight of them from the distance.

During the whole time we spent with them, nothing appeared to indicate that they had any chiefs. Each family, on the contrary, seemed to us, to live in perfect independence: though we observed in the children the greatest subordination to their parents, and in the women the same to their husbands. It appeared, that the women were careful to avoid giving their husbands any occasion for jealousy: though, when we returned on board, one of the crew boasted of the