Some people likewise thought they had seen the footsteps of a tyger-cat. We have killed some large pigeons of great beauty. Their plumage was green-gold; their neck and belly of a greyish-white; and they have a little crest on the head. Here are likewise turtle-doves, some widow-birds larger than those of the Brasils, parrots, crown-birds; and another kind, whose cry so well resembles the barking of a dog, that every one who hears it for the first time, must be deceived by it. We have likewise seen turtle in different parts of the channel; but this was not the season when they lay eggs. In this bay are fine sandy creeks, where I believe a good number of turtle could be caught at the proper time.
All the country is mountainous; the soil is very light, and the rocks are hardly covered with it. However, the trees are very tall, and there are several species of very fine wood. There we find the Betel, the Areca, and the fine Indian-reed, which we get from the Malays. It grows here in marshy places; but whether it requires a peculiar culture, or whether the trees, which entirely overshadow the earth, hinder its growth, and change its quality, or whether we were not here at the proper season when it is in maturity, so much is certain, that we never found any fine ones here. The pepper-tree is likewise common to this country; but it had neither fruit nor. flowers at this season. The country, upon the whole, is not very rich for a botanist. There remain no marks in it of any fixed habitation: it is certain that the Indians come this way from time to time; we frequently found places upon the sea-shore, where they had stopped; the remnants of their meals easily betrayed them.
Cruel famine
which we suffer.
On the 10th, a sailor died on board the Etoile, of a complication of disorders, without any mixture of the scurvy. The three following days were fine, and we made good use of them. We refitted the heel of our mizen-mast, which was worm-eaten in the step; and the Etoile shortened hers, the head of it being sprung. We likewise took in, from on board the store-ship, the flour and biscuit which still belonged to us, in proportion to our number. There were fewer pulse than we at first thought, and I was obliged to cut off above a third part of the allowance of the (gourganes) pease or caravanses for our soup: I say ours, for every thing was equally distributed. The officers and the sailors had the same nourishment; our situation, like death, rendered all ranks of men equal. We likewise profited of the fair weather, to make good observations.
Observation of longitude.
On the 11th, in the morning, M. Verron brought his quadrant and pendulum on shore, and employed them the same day, to take the sun’s altitude at noon. The motion of the pendulum was exactly determined by several corresponding altitudes, taken for two days consecutively. On the 13th, there was an eclipse of the sun visible to us, and we got every thing in readiness to observe it, if the weather permitted. It was very fair; and we saw both the moment of immersion, and that of emersion. M. Verron observed with a telescope of nine feet; the chevalier du Bouchage with one of Dollond’s acromatic telescopes, four feet long; my place was at the pendulum. The beginning of the eclipse was to us, on the 13th, at 10h. 5′ 45″ in the morning, the end at 00 h. 28′ 16″ true time, and its magnitude 3′ 22″. We have buried an inscription under the very spot where the pendulum had been; and we called this harbour Port Praslin.
This observation is so much the more important, as it was now possible, by its means, and by the astronomical observations, made upon the coast of Peru, to determine, in a certain fixed manner, the extent of longitude of the vast Pacific Ocean, which, till now, had been so uncertain. Our good fortune, in having fair weather at the time of the eclipse, was so much the greater, as from that day to our departure there was not a single day but what was dreadful. The continued rains, together with the suffocating heat, rendered our stay here very pernicious to us. On the 16th, the frigate had completed her works, and we employed all our boats to finish those of the Etoile. This store-ship was quite light, and as there were no stones proper for ballast, we were obliged to make use of wood for that purpose; this was a long troublesome labour, which in these forests, where an eternal humidity prevails, is likewise unwholesome.
Description of two insects.
Here we daily killed snakes, scorpions, and great numbers of insects, of a singular sort. They are three or four inches long, and covered over with a kind of armour; they have six legs, projecting points on the sides, and a very long tail. Our people likewise brought me another creature, which appeared extraordinary to us all. It is an insect about three inches long, and belongs to the Mantis genus. Almost every part of its body is of such a texture, as one would take for a leaf, even when one looks closely at it. Each of its wings is one half of a leaf, which is entire when the two wings are closed together; the under side of its body resembles a leaf, of a more dead colour than the upper one. The creature has two antennæ and six legs, of which the upper joints are likewise similar to parts of leaves. M. de Commerçon has described this singular insect; and I placed it in the king’s cabinet, preserved in spirits.
Here we found abundance of shells, many of them very fine. The shoals offered treasures for the study of Conchology. We met with ten hammer-oysters in one place, and they are said to be a scarce species[[120]]. The curiosity of some of our people was accordingly raised to a great pitch; but an accident happening to one of our sailors abated their zeal. |Sailor bit by a water-snake.| He was bit in the water by a kind of snake as he was hauling the seine. The poisonous effects of the bite appeared in half an hour’s time. The sailor felt an excessive pain all over his body. The spot where he had been bit, which was on the left side, became livid, and swelled visibly. Four or five scarifications extracted a quantity of blood, which was already dissolved. Our people were obliged to lead the patient walking, to prevent his getting convulsions. He suffered greatly for five or six hours together. At last the treacle (theriaque) and flower de luce water which had been given him, brought on an abundant perspiration, and cured him.