Women and children were seized with a seasickness
that was no joke. The decks resounded with such wails that Cook had to
lie to in the storm, put off the pinnace, and send the visitors ashore.
What sort of a tale they carried back, we may guess. Meanwhile the
storm had snapped the foremast of the _Resolution_. As if rushing on
his ruin, Cook steered back for the bay and anchored midway between the
two villages. Again the tents were pitched beside the Morai under the
cocoanut groves. Again the wand was drawn round the tenting place; but
the white men had taught the savages that the _taboo_ was no longer
sacred. Where thousands had welcomed the ships before, not a soul now
appeared. Not a canoe cut the waters. Not a voice broke the silence
of the bay.
The sailors were sour; Cook, angry. When the men rowed to the villages
for fresh provisions, they were pelted with stones. When at night-time
the savages came to the ships with fresh food, they asked higher prices
and would take only daggers and knives in pay. Only by firing its
great guns could the {203} _Discovery_ prevent forcible theft by the
savages offering provisions; and in the scuffle of pursuit after one
thief, Pareea--a chief most friendly to the whites--was knocked down by
a white man's oar.
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