With many
professions of lasting friendship and promises of future
intercourse; while the matter-of-fact captain anathematized him
in his heart for a grasping, trafficking savage; as shrewd and
sordid in his dealings as a white man. As one of the vessels of
the company will, in the course of events, have to appeal to the
justice and magnanimity of this island potentate, we shall see
how far the honest captain was right in his opinion.
* It appears, from the accounts of subsequent voyagers, that
Tamaahmaah afterwards succeeded in his wish of purchasing a large
ship. In this he sent a cargo of sandal-wood to Canton, having
discovered that the foreign merchants trading with him made large
profits on this wood, shipped by them from the islands to the
Chinese markets. The ship was manned by natives, but the officers
were Englishmen. She accomplished her voyage, and returned in
safety to the islands, with the Hawaiian flag floating gloriously
in the breeze. The king hastened on board, expecting to find his
sandal-wood converted into crapes and damasks, and other rich
stuffs of China, but found, to his astonishment, by the
legerdemain of traffic, his cargo had all disappeared, and, in
place of it, remained a bill of charges amounting to three
thousand dollars. It was some time before he could be made to
comprehend certain of the most important items of the bill, such
as pilotage, anchorage, and custom-house fees; but when he
discovered that maritime states in other countries derived large
revenues in this manner, to the great cost of the merchant,
"Well," cried he, "then I will have harbor fees also." He
established them accordingly. Pilotage a dollar a foot on the
draft of each vessel. Anchorage from sixty to seventy dollars. In
this way he greatly increased the royal revenue, and turned his
China speculation to account.
CHAPTER VII.
Departure From the Sandwich Islands.- Misunderstandings- Miseries
of a Suspicious Man.- Arrival at the Columbia - Dangerous
Service. - Gloomy Apprehensions- Bars and Breakers.- Perils of
the Ship. Disasters of a Boat's Crew.-Burial of a Sandwich
Islander.
IT was on the 28th of February that the Tonquin set sail from the
Sandwich Islands. For two days the wind was contrary, and the
vessel was detained in their neighborhood; at length a favorable
breeze sprang up, and in a little while the rich groves, green
hills, and snowy peaks of those happy islands one after another
sank from sight, or melted into the blue distance, and the
Tonquin ploughed her course towards the sterner regions of the
Pacific.
The misunderstandings between the captain and his passengers
still continued; or rather, increased in gravity. By his
altercations and his moody humors, he had cut himself off from
all community of thought, or freedom of conversation with them.
He disdained to ask questions as to their proceedings, and could
only guess at the meaning of their movements, and in so doing
indulged in conjectures and suspicions, which produced the most
whimsical self-torment.
Thus, in one of his disputes with them, relative to the goods on
board, some of the packages of which they wished to open, to take
out articles of clothing for the men or presents for the natives,
he was so harsh and peremptory that they lost all patience, and
hinted that they were the strongest party, and might reduce him
to a very ridiculous dilemma, by taking from him the command.
A thought now flashed across the captain's mind that they really
had a plan to depose him, and that, having picked up some
information at Owyhee, possibly of war between the United States
and England, they meant to alter the destination of the voyage;
perhaps to seize upon ship and cargo for their own use.
Once having conceived this suspicion, everything went to foster
it. They had distributed fire-arms among some of their men, a
common precaution among the fur traders when mingling with the
natives. This, however, looked like preparation. Then several of
the partners and clerks and some of the men, being Scotsmen, were
acquainted with the Gaelic, and held long conversations together
in that language. These conversations were considered by the
captain of a "mysterious and unwarranted nature," and related, no
doubt, to some foul conspiracy that was brewing among them. He
frankly avows such suspicions, in his letter to Mr. Astor, but
intimates that he stood ready to resist any treasonous outbreak;
and seems to think that the evidence of preparation on his part
had an effect in overawing the conspirators.
The fact is, as we have since been informed by one of the
parties, it was a mischievous pleasure with some of the partners
and clerks, who were young men, to play upon the suspicious
temper and splenetic humors of the captain. To this we may
ascribe many of their whimsical pranks and absurd propositions,
and, above all, their mysterious colloquies in Gaelic.
In this sore and irritable mood did the captain pursue his
course, keeping a wary eye on every movement, and bristling up
whenever the detested sound of the Gaelic language grated upon
his ear. Nothing occurred, however, materially to disturb the
residue of the voyage excepting a violent storm; and on the
twenty-second of March, the Tonquin arrived at the mouth of the
Oregon, or Columbia River.
The aspect of the river and the adjacent coast was wild and
dangerous. The mouth of the Columbia is upwards of four miles
wide with a peninsula and promontory on one side, and a long low
spit of land on the other; between which a sand bar and chain of
breakers almost block the entrance. The interior of the country
rises into successive ranges of mountains, which, at the time of
the arrival of the Tonquin, were covered with snow.
