some misunderstanding having happened between some of the seamen
and the natives, an insult had been offered by one or other,
which was resented by the opposite party; a quarrel ensued, and
the impossibility of moving the boats, exposed the officers and
crews to the rage of the multitude, who attacked them with clubs
and showers of stones, and would inevitably have massacred the
whole, if there had not been a small boat at hand, which picked
up those, who depending on their swimming, had quitted the
shore.

Many of the natives were killed upon this occasion; and the
loss of the ships was said to have been fourteen persons killed,
including Captain de L'Angle, and some other officers; several
were much wounded; and the boats were entirely destroyed.

This account of the accident is by no means to be considered
as a correct statement of it; as it is only collected from little
hints dropt in the course of conversation with different officers
of those ships: they did not appear disposed to speak upon that
subject, we therefore did not presume to interrogate. The voyage
of those ships will no doubt be published by authority; till then
we must wait for the particulars of that, and another unfortunate
accident which happened to them upon the west coast of America,
where they lost two boats and twenty-two men, including six
officers, in a surf.

[A TABLE of the WINDS and WEATHER, etc. etc. on a Passage
from Rio de Janeiro to the Cape of Good Hope; and from thence to
Botany-Bay, on the East Coast of New Holland, on board His
Majesty's Ship SIRIUS, in 1787, and Beginning of 1788.]