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[Page 12]
Thursday, 3rd September. After the storm on Sunday last, we steamed in a general northerly direction with nothing to note, till Tuesday morning. About 5 a.m. we hove to just off the Reef at Moloelab, one of the Marshall Islands. (German) Berry and myself went ashore in the dingy, and had quite a lively time landing in the surf. A big wave would lift the boat high in the air, and below you could see the reef, with only about 1 foot of water covering it. You expect any moment to be thrown down on to this sharp and jagged coral, and the boat smashed to pieces, but instead you just shoot along on top of the wave, and land in shallow water high up on the Reef. The coral on most of these Reefs is very sharp and pointed, and you can get a very nasty cut from it – besides which the cut takes a very long time to heal, the coral having a certain amount of poison in it. The natives walk about on the reefs barefoot, and very seldom get a scratch at all – that will give you some idea of how tough their feet are.
After landing we had to walk about 1 ½ miles to a trader's (Tom Ashley) place, our object being to see if he had heard anything about the "INDUNA", as she calls there on her voyage round the Marshalls. A nigger led the way through the bush, which is very dense here – in fact you could easily get lost as there are no high places where you could climb up to see anything.
Ashley was very surprised to see us, and more so when we told him that there was a War on – he had not heard anything about it at all. We stopped at his place for ki-ki, and as he had