hair in moderately long pipe-like ringlets, while others had it cut
close. All were perfectly naked, and the only ornaments worn were the
large round pearl-shell on the breast. The canoe was rather singular in
form, with greater beam than I had ever seen in one, nor did the sides
tumble home as usual; the bow was sharp, but the stern square, as if
effected by cutting a very large canoe in halves, and filling up the open
end. We saw several bamboo bows and bundles of arrows, stowed away under
the platform; these the natives would not part with, but a large quantity
of very fine tortoise-shell was obtained, chiefly in exchange for leaf
tobacco, which they know by the name of sugub.

When the tide slackened we got underweigh, and the natives returned to
their island. Sue, although the largest of the Three Sisters, is not more
than the third of a mile in length. Like all the islands of the eastern
side of Torres Strait, with the exception of the Darnley and Murray
Islands, this is of the coral sand formation, low and thickly wooded.
Some coconut-trees grow at the west end of the island, where there is a
native village which we approached close enough to have a good view of it
with the spy-glass. It consisted of several long huts, thatched with
grass, which apparently are not much used during the daytime, as we saw
no one entering or coming out of them. Many of the people, both men and
women, ran down to the beach, waving green branches to induce us to land;
others were sitting down under temporary sheds made by stretching large
mats--the sails of their canoes--over a framework of sticks. The inside
of one large enclosure was concealed by a fence six feet high, and an
adjacent shed, under which some cooking was going on, was completely
covered with some recent shells of turtle, apparently about thirty in
number. Three very large canoes were hauled up on the beach, protected
from the sun by matting, and two smaller ones were kept afloat. There
appeared to be about 60 people upon the island, from which, and other