THE NAUTICAL MAGAZINE AND NAVAL CHRONICLE. JANUARY, 1870. AUSTRALIA (NEWCASTLE) TO CHINA, touching at Pleasant Island, In the Barque Glenisle. Mauritius, October 22nd, 1869. DEAR SIR,-Having read Captain Brown's accounts of his passages from Australia to China, during the months of October and November, 1865, and to Japan in March, 1868, and having made the passage last year, east of New Caledonia, during the months of August and September, I now take the liberty of sending you a short account of it to see if you think any part of it worthy of a place in the Nautical, and if so I may take the liberty again, and try to contribute a little towards getting a little more for our shilling, which you seem willing to give if we will assist. We sailed from Newcastle N.S.W. on August 6th, with the wind moderate from the S.E. On the 10th, wind S. W., having good observations, and finding that we would pass near the Middleton Shoal during daylight, steered to get a sight of it. At two p.m. knowing we must be drawing near it I went to the masthead and soon made it out. I found the position given of it very correct, having only been a few days out and chronometer good. It was a splendid sight as seen by us during the daylight. We could see the breakers on it all round. the reef, but quite smooth in the interior. From the 11th to the 17th, wind from W.S.W. to W.N.W. with hard squalls and rain: did not see Hunter or Feern Island as we were too far east. On rounding it, wind gradually hauling round to the S.E. until we sighted Mitre Island on the 23rd. This island looks like two on passing the west side of it, and on the north side of it there is a high rock which looks very much like a ship under sail. At noon we sighted Anouda or Cherry Island, the position of which I make is lat. 11° 36' S., long. 169° 43′ 15′′ E. When we were fully twelve miles from the island we saw a canoe NO. 1-VOL. XXXIX. B paddling towards us. On nearing it we gave them a rope and allowed two out of the five persons in her to come on deck. They both stood six feet high and were naked, with the exception of a small cloth round the loins. Their canoe was very neatly made, being cut out of a solid log and the shape of an albicore. We experienced the westerly current as far as Pleasant Island, which Captain Brown mentions.* On the morning of the 29th at daybreak we sighted Pleasant Island. We seemed to have been seen from the island as soon as we saw it, as we could observe several canoes coming out towards us. At seven a m. we had two or three of them alongside, and a whale boat with an Englishman in her. They did not attempt to come on board until they had received permission to do so. As soon as they were on deck there commenced a strong bartering match, they having cocoa nuts, a few fowls, a few eggs, and some large sized flying fish. One of the natives had a pistol; and another had an English Bible which he had obtained from some passing ship. He offered it to me for five gun-caps, or ten fishhooks. The Englishman had a few mats, very neatly made from the cocoanut leaf, which I got for a bag of small bread. There was another whale boat that came alongside at this time with another Englishman in her, who had been twenty-eight years on the island. His son was with him, a youth eighteen years of age. They brought three pigs in their boat, which I bought. There were several more canoes came alongside, and I believe we had a visit from the same old woman mentioned by Captain Brown, and I am certain we are not the first ship that she has visited. I just saw her once, as she kept at the fore part of the ship. As to her beauty, just picture to yourself a kitchen wench of Shakespeare, and you have her true likeness. I spoke to the Englishmen about the island having a bad name, and they told me it was owing to a man named Jones who had been taken off the island by a man-of-war. They told me that they try to visit all ships that pass within an easy distance, and seemed to be very anxious for it to be known that they could supply ships with pigs and cocoanut oil. I told them they ought to try and cultivate potatoes which they said they would do. I read them the account of the island in the Nautical for 1865, and they were quite proud to think that they are mentioned in it. They gave me an advertisements to put in the papers if I should come back to the colonies. This I take the liberty to enclose you; but I am making my story of the island too long. We had them on board for four hours. They wished me to tell them what I made the position of the island. They said it was nine miles across, and twenty-two miles in circumference, and from what I made the west end in, I think Captain Cheyne's position is the correct one for the centre, which I see is given in last year's Nautical, as I made the west end to be in long. 167° E., • Page 72, February, 1868. We have tried to read this production, and from the very faulty writing we have failed.-ED. and I had the mean of eighteen sets of Lunars two days afterwards, and found the chronometers going steady, and got the errors, thanks to Mr. Toynbee's hints on Lunars, which I find very useful. I spoke to several captains in China who have had a visit from Pleasant Island, but I must conclude and go on with the passage. We had light variable winds from the Equator to lat. 8° N., and bad an easterly current of from twenty-five to thirty miles per day, which set us down in sight of Baring Island, although steering every day to pass within sight of Ovalou or Armstrong Island. I saw the track of four other ships making the passage about the same time that were set in the same direction. We then got a light breeze from the S.E. which brought us out of the bight again, and we felt a slight westerly current from then until we were in lat. 14° N., long. 155° E., wind varying from S.E. to S. W., and a strong S. W. sea. We passed in sight of Arecifos or Providence Island, intending to steer up to sight Almagen or Grigan of the Marianne Group, and from there to pass to the northward of the Loo Choos. But we never felt any Trades until after we had passed the Mariannes; and then only had them light for a day or two. Then we found the wind from North, which obliged us to pass to leeward of the Loo Choo Islands, where we had a three or four days beat, although we felt the benefit of the Kuro Siwo or Japan current by being inside. The wind then came round from the eastward, and two days afterwards we sighted the Saddles, sixty-two days from Newcastle. Four ships of us having sailed the same day bound to Shanghai, three of us were in sight together in passing the light ship, the other made the passage in fifty-one days. Two struck off from Brown's Range, and entered the China Sea by Van Diemen's Strait. They made the best passage, as the slowest sailer amongst us was up to the light ship at the same time as we were, and we were fourteen days ahead of her at the Arecifos, which she gained on us again by carrying steadier winds. You will see by this, that it is just the opposite to what Captain Brown experienced going the same passage during the months of October and November, 1865. I blamed the equinox for our having no Trades, and think that if we had been later and the Trades properly established again after the equinox, we should have done best by passing through the Mariannes, and not going so far north until we drew up towards the Loo Choos. I have seen several tracks up west of New Caledonia. One ship was thirty-five days from Newcastle to Shanghai; two others fortyeight days, but these were all fast ships. I am afraid I am getting too long, and it will give you too much trouble to pick anything out of it. I should not have taken heart to write it, if it had not been for our friend with the queer name in the January number of the Nautical, where he says you will kindly take the trouble to cull anything useful out of what may be sent you. So if you should think any part of this letter worthy of a place in the Nautical, I shall feel glad to see it there; and it will give me heart to try and write to you again. I was rather surprised on reaching home and getting the Nauticals for 1867, 1868, and part of 1869, to find that the Mauritius hurricane of March, 1868, was not mentioned, as it was one of the heaviest they have had for many years. I remain, yours, most respectfully, To the Editor of the Nautical Magazine. WILLIAM HALL. [Our correspondent does good service to Navigation by his information, and we hope he will take heart in seeing that we appreciate his letters. Thus the best passage or the way to make it from Australia to China, receives confirmation and becomes useful to his brother seamen. We regret being unable to decipher the advertisement he encloses from Pleasant Island, but it seems of little consequence as he tells us himself what the islanders themselves have for sale. In reference to the Mauritius Hurricanes, their story has so often been told in our pages, and they are so regular in their occurrence, that we did not consider anything would be learned by noticing that to which he has above alluded. But we hope to hear again from Captain Hall, and can assure him that he may safely leave his imagined prolixity to our care.-ED.] ON THE ORIGIN AND MIGRATION OF THE POLYNESIAN NATION. By the Rev. D. Lang, M.S.A. THE following paper on the Polynesian races of the various islands of the Great Pacific Ocean has been recently read before the Royal Society at Sydney, in Australia. And as these people are daily becoming more acquainted with us, both through our own Missionaries, as well as those of our American brethren, the information which it contains cannot but be acceptable to our numerous readers who occasionally visit them. Without waiting, therefore, for its transmission through another channel, we avail ourselves of the copy we find in the Sydney Morning Herald, of September 1st, to whose columns our journal is no stranger. The Author proceeds thus : : The singular phenomenon which the South Sea Islands present to the eye of a philosophical observer is perhaps one of the most difficult to account for that has ever exercised the ingenuity of man. From the Sandwich Islands in the Northern to New Zealand in the Southern Hemisphere; from the Indian Archipelago to Easter Island, near the continent of America-an extent of ocean comprising sixty degrees of latitude and a hundred and twenty of longitude (i.e., exactly twice the extent of the ancient Roman Empire in its greatest glory)-the same primitive language is spoken, the same singular customs prevail, the same semi-barbarous nation inhabits the multitude of the isles. In using this language, however, I would not be understood to |