This Island I Named Ann's Island, In Compliment To Mrs.
King, The Wife Of The Governor.
"In putting the surveying instruments into the boat the chain was found
missing; we were of opinion it had been left on shore by the soldiers who
carried it in measuring the distances.
A boat with one of them was sent
on shore. After a fruitless search they were returning when a canoe put
off from the island with a man in it who held up the chain in his hand.
The boat's crew brought him on board to me. On looking at the chain it
was made up in the usual way...and tied with a piece of string; but in
undoing it I found that the natives had untwisted every bend of the wires
which contained the brass markers and after taking them off bent the
wires back into their original form, with this difference, that they
placed the end which is carried in the hand in the middle. This was the
first instance I had experienced of their pilfering anything and I did
not chuse to proceed to extremities. I gave the native a blanket and some
biscuits and the mate gave him an old hat.
"We got into the boat to prosecute the intention of surveying the
island...the native with us, towing his canoe astern. On landing we were
joined by a great number of natives who seemed glad that the man had been
rewarded for carrying back the chain.
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