He stood, as he spoke, with his musket in his hand
pointed towards the savages, and then slowly retreated, while Dr Cockle sprang on board. We had our oars ready to shove off as soon as the mate was safe.
“Come on, Mr Griffiths, come on,” cried several others.
The savages were scarcely a dozen yards from us as the mate threw himself over the bows, and we quickly shoved the boat into deep water, while the savages stood yelling and heaving stones at us from the beach.
Just, however, as we got the boat’s head to sea we saw, coming round a point to the eastward, four or five large canoes. It seemed impossible that we could escape them.