Series 03: Joseph Banks - Endeavour journal, 25 August 1768 - 12 July 1771 (vol. 2) - No. 0135
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[Page 135]
131.
Janry. 1770. Totara nue
the sides were every where so steep the as to render fortifications even in their way almost totaly useless accordingly there was nothing but a slight Palisade & one small fighting stage at one end where the rock was most accessible The people brought us several Bones of men the flesh of which they had eat which are now become a kind of article of trade among our people who constantly ask for them & purchase them for whatever trifles they have. in one part we observd a Kind of wooden Cross ornamented with feathers made exactly in the form of a Crucifix cross this engagd our attention & we were told that it was a monument for a dead man maybe a Cenotaph as the body was not there thus much they told us but would not let us Know where it was
All the while we were among the Indians they kept still talking something about gunns & shooting people which we could not at all understand they did it however so much that it engagd us all so much that we talkd about it in our return but the more we thought the more dark was the subject till we came on board when on mentioning I was told that on the 21st one of our officers who went out on pretence of