This bay, as I have before observed, lies on the west side of Cape Bret, and I named it the _Bay of Islands_, from the great number of islands which line its shores, and from several harbours equally safe and commodious, where there is room and depth for any number of shipping. That in which we lay is on the south-west side of the south-westermost island, called _Maturaro_, on the south-east side of the bay. I have made no accurate survey of this bay, being discouraged by the time it would cost me; I thought also that it was sufficient to be able to affirm that it afforded us good anchorage, and refreshment of every kind. It was not the season for roots, but we had plenty of fish, most of which, however, we purchased of the natives, for we could catch very little ourselves either with net or line. When we shewed the natives our seine, which is such as the king's ships are generally furnished with, they laughed at it, and in triumph produced their own, which was indeed of an enormous size, and made of a kind of grass, which is very strong: It was five fathom deep, and by the room it took up, it could not be less than three or four hundred fathom long. Fishing seems indeed to be the chief business of life in this part of the country; we saw about all their towns a great number of nets, laid in heaps like hay-cocks, and covered with a thatch to keep them from the weather, and we scarcely entered a house where some of the people were not employed in making them. The fish we procured here were sharks, stingrays, sea-bream, mullet, mackrel, and some others. The inhabitants in this bay are far more numerous than in any other part of the country that we had before visited; it did not appear to us that they were united under one head, and though their towns were fortified, they seemed to live together in perfect amity. It is high water in this bay at the full and change of the moon, about eight o'clock, and the tide then rises from six to eight feet perpendicularly. It appears from such observations as I was able to make of the tides upon the sea-coast, that the flood comes from the southward; and I have reason to think that there is a current which comes from the westward, and sets along the shore to the S.E. or S.S.E. as the land happens to lie. [66] [Footnote 66: Some sketches of the Bay of Islands, and a good deal of valuable information about it, are given by Mr Savage in his Account of New Zealand, to which we shall be indebted hereafter.--E.] SECTION XXV. _Range from the Bay of Islands round North Cape to Queen Charlotte's Sound; and a Description of that Part of the Coast_.