most south-eastwardly of the group, which is called by the natives Ea- Ou-Whe, and received from Tasman the name of Middleburg. To the congeries of islands formed here, which consist of more than twenty in number, and extend through about three degrees of latitude, and two of longitude, captain Cook gave the general name of the Friendly Islands, on account of the firm alliance and friendship, which seemed to subsist among the inhabitants, and from their courteous behaviour to strangers. On quitting this country, our navigator sailed to New Zealand, and in coming round the coast, near to Cook's Straits, in November 1773, the two ships again separated; captain Furneaux arrived a second time in Queen Charlotte's Sound, some little while after the Resolution had left it. While he lay here, the cutter, in which were two midshipmen and eight seamen, was sent up a creek to procure wood and water; not returning the commander became anxious for their safety. The next day an officer was sent in another boat in search of them. The first intimations which they received of the fate of their comrades, was the sight of the rullock-parts of the cutter, and some shoes, one of which was known to have belonged to a midshipman who was of the party; presently a piece of meat was found, which was at first supposed to be some of the salted meat belonging to the cutter's crew, but on a closer examination it proved to be fresh. Several baskets were found on the beach tied up, which they eagerly cut open, and found them to contain roasted flesh and fern-roots, which served the natives for bread: on further search many shoes were found, and a hand, which was immediately known to belong to a fore-castle-man, it being marked with the initial

letters of his name by an Otaheitean tattowing instrument. Proceeding onward to the next bay, a great many people appeared on the beach, and three or four canoes; on the approach of the boat they retreated to a small island: on the beach were two bundles of celery, which had been gathered for loading the cutter; a broken oar was stuck upright in the ground, to which the natives had tied their canoes. They searched in vain on every part of the beach for the cutter, but a shocking spectacle suddenly opened upon them. Here were scattered the heads, hearts and lungs of several of the unhappy men, who had been murdered by the natives, and dogs were seen devouring their entrails. Horror chilled the sailors' blood at the sight, which urged them to a fierce desire of revenge. They fired and killed several of the savages, and destroyed all the canoes that lay on the beach.

When captain Cook visited this country, on his third voyage, in February, 1777, Pedroe or Matahouah, an old friend of captain Cook's in his former voyage, informed Omai of the circumstances attending this unhappy affair; he said, that while the party from the ship were sitting at dinner, surrounded by several of the natives, some of the latter stole or snatched from them some bread and fish, for which they were beaten. This being resented, a quarrel ensued, and two New Zealanders were shot dead by the only muskets that were fired; for, before the party had time to discharge a third, or to load again those that had been fired, the natives rushed in upon them, overpowered them with their numbers, and put them all to death. A black servant of captain Furneaux's, who was left in the. boat to take care of her, was afterwards said to be

the cause of the quarrel; for a native stealing something out of the boat, the negro gave him a severe blow with a stick. The cries of the fellow being heard by his countrymen at a distance, they imagined he was killed, and immediately began the attack on the party ashore, who fell a sacrifice to the fury of their savage assailants. These different accounts were supported by different kinds of authority, Captain Cook thinks both of them to be true, as they perfectly coincide; the quarrel appears to have happened while the boat's crew were sitting at their meal, and while some of the natives were stealing from the man who had been left in the boat, others of them might take the same liberty • with the property of those who were on shore. However, the catastrophe appears not to have arisen from any deliberate plan of slaughter concerted by the natives, but from unpremeditated resentment and sudden fury.

Captain Furneaux being thus deprived of so considerable a number of his people, and seeing no probability of forming a junction with the Resolution, after having refreshed his crew, determined to return home by the most direct course, and safely arrived at Spithead in July, 1774.

The two separations which happened to the ships in this voyage, at times when the commander of the expedition was engaged, or engaging in the most severe and perilous object of his voyage, cannot but excite an apprehension, that his coadjutor had no great propensity to approximate towards the pole, especially when it is considered, that the two ships, which made the succeeding voyage, though employed on the service during four years, never lost each other. Indeed, when the nature of the enter

prise is considered, the wonder is, that a man could be found to accomplish such a navigation as that to the southward, not that he wanted a second in the enterprise. Captain Cook himself, who dared to do all that man dare do, would not, perhaps, have conducted an attendant ship in such a course. It is the commander in chief who reaps that universal and never-dying fame, which can alone stimulate to an attempt so far beyond ordinary humanity.

CHAP. II.

The second attempt made by captain Cook, in the Resolution, to penetrate towards the South Pole. From his sailing from New Zealand, in November 1773, to his arrival at Cape Deseada, in December 1774.

OUR indefatigable navigator had made the best use of the four winter months, by cruising in the middle latitudes of the South Sea, in which time he examined a space of more than 40 degrees of longitude between the tropics. The savage rocks of New Zealand then only afforded a short shelter, while he changed his fair weather rigging for such as might resist the storms and rigours of more inhospitable climates.

Captain Cook having now lost his consort, the Adventure, entered on his second southern course alone, on the 27th of November, of which he speaks in the following terms: "It being the unanimous opinion of every one, that the Adventure could neither be stranded on the coast, nor be in any of the harbours, I therefore gave up looking for her, and all thoughts of seeing her any more during the voyage, as no rendezvous was absolutely fixed upon after leaving New Zealand. Nevertheless, that did

not discourage me from fully exploring the southern parts of the Pacific Ocean, in the doing of which I intended to employ the whole of the ensuing season. On our quitting the coast, and consequently all hopes of being joined by our consort, I had the satisfaction to find that not a man was dejected, or thought the dangers we had yet to go through were in the least increased by being alone; but as cheerfully proceeded to the south, or wherever I might think proper to lead them, as if the Adventure, or even more ships, had been in our company." But while the seamen viewed their destination with a cheerful acquiescence, the philosophers seemed to consider it enveloped in all its gloom, as appears from Mr. Forster's relation: "The officers and passengers," says he, "entered on this second cruise under several difficulties, which did not exist before: they had not now any live stock to be compared to that which they took from the Cape of Good Hope; and the little stock of provisions which had supplied their table with variety, in preference to that of the common sailor, was now so far consumed, that they were become nearly upon a level; especially as the seamen were inured to that way of life, by constant habit, almost from their infancy, and the others had never experienced it before. The hope of meeting with new lands was vanished; the topics of common conversation were exhausted; the cruise to the south could not present any thing new, but appeared in all its chilling horrors before us; and the absence of our consort doubled every danger. We had enjoyed a few agreeable days between the tropics; we had feasted as well as the produce of the several islands would permit; and we had been entertained with the novelty of various