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They finally got so excited that the captain was frightened, and to make them leave he pointed his gun at them. But they only grabbed for it, thinking p355 it was a present. The iron and brass work interested them the most. They would feel of it and try to break pieces off, and the boats they examined all over, making queer noises at everything they could not understand. Finally the captain got so aroused that he could stand it no longer; he told me to start the engines. While I was getting it ready, five excited faces watched me through the skylight, but as the first gas explosion came, those five excited faces vanished. Our visitors had jumped overboard into their canoes, leaving behind the things I had given them in exchange for their spears and the chair. Also, they had left two strings of porpoise teeth (worth about £2 in the Solomons, where they use them for money). I kept the porpoise teeth, but the other things we wrapped in an old oilskin and threw into one of the boats. I went below and threw on the clutch, and when I came up, I saw the five men fighting over the old iron I had given them. They fought and squabbled, and dropped the biscuits overboard into the water, apparently not recognising their value. One, to whom I had given a stick of tobacco, had tasted it, and finding it nauseous, had thrown it away.

We steamed ten miles into the passage between the two islands; then I stopped the engine and we slowly drifted through. At sunset a canoe followed us for an hour, but we drifted too fast for them, and they gave it up when about five miles from shore. I'll wager it was a tired canoe-load of natives that put in p356 to land last night, for they had to paddle hard against the current.

The captain seems to have a notion in his head that we mustn't make any speed. What his reason is, I don't know.

To-day we are calmed about twenty miles off the islands, and it's hotter than sin. The tar in the deck is melting and bubbling up through the seams, so that a person feels as if walking on molasses, when compelled to walk.

Saturday, February 13, 1909.

The fifth day, the wind let us, but we still had the heavy seas. On trying to make a little sail, we found the rigging on the mizzen-mast to be in bad condition, and it took all hands a day to repair it. Then the gooseneck on the staysail broke, and as we have no other, we patched it up with ropes. On raising the mainsail, the throat-halyards carried away, and when they were repaired, the peak did the same. A good stiff wind and the heavy seas continued, so we dared not put on full sail, but have been creeping along under double-reefed main and mizzen sails and have not attempted to set the other jib. This old captain is certainly afraid to make sail, for during the last few days we could easily have had reefs out of the sails and the jib set; but as the barometer is still low and he does not like the look of the leaden sky, he will not do it. He and I had a hot argument a few days ago because I wanted more sail put on, and he informed me that he was captain, and for me to tend to my own business—so that is what I am doing. But I know we could be a couple of hundred miles to the south if he would not be so careful. Henry is madder than a hornet; says if we stop anywhere south of Sydney he will go ashore, for he does not want to work for p358 such a timid old man. But he couldn't do what he threatens, for the authorities would not allow a dark-skinned man ashore.

Henry has a fit of grouchiness, so he is snappy and growling all the time. Tehei is so homesick that he can't be cheerful. Wada is cheerful enough; but take it all in all, it is mighty unpleasant company.