One of the natives, carrying a wooden sword, and apparently a leading man among them, made some signs and used gesticulations expressive of sleep or death with reference to a part of Joannet Island which he repeatedly pointed to.

This we could not understand.* After a certain degree of confidence had been restored, five or six of us remained on shore, and great harmony appeared to prevail throughout the combined party.

In one place the sergeant of marines was seated on the sand with a ring of people round him whom he was drilling into the mode of singing a Port Essington aboriginal song, occasionally rising to vary his lesson with a dance--in another, a group of natives were being initiated in the mysteries of the Jew's harp, or kept amused by the performance of various antics.

Mr.Huxley as usual, was at work with his sketch-book, and I employed myself in procuring words for an incipient vocabulary.

My principal informant was called Wadai, a little withered old man with shaved head, on which someone had stuck a red night-cap which greatly took his fancy.