In the Aur group the navigator noticed amongst a crowd of natives who climbed on to the vessel, two natives whose faces and tattooing seemed to mark them as of alien race. One of them, Kadu by name, especially pleased the commander, who gave him some bits of iron, and Kotzebue was surprised that he did not receive them with the same pleasure as his companions. This was explained the same evening. When all the natives were leaving the vessel, Kadu earnestly begged to be allowed to remain on the _Rurik_, and never again to leave it. The commander only yielded to his wishes after a great deal of persuasion. "Kadu," says Kotzebue, "had scarcely obtained permission, when he turned quickly to his comrades, who were waiting for him, declared to them his intention of remaining on board the ship, and distributed his iron among the chiefs. The astonishment in the boats was beyond description: they tried in vain to shake his resolution; he was immovable. At last his friend Edock came back, spoke long and seriously to him, and when he found that his persuasion was of no avail, he attempted to drag him by force; but Kadu now used the right of the strongest, he pushed his friend from him, and the boats sailed off. His resolution being inexplicable to me, I conceived a notion that he perhaps intended to steal during the night, and privately to leave the ship, and therefore had the night-watch doubled, and his bed made up close to mine on the deck, where I slept, on account of the heat. Kadu felt greatly honoured to sleep close to the tamon of the ship." Born at Ulle, one of the Caroline Islands, more than 300 miles from the group where he was now living, Kadu, with Edok and two other fellow-countrymen, had been overtaken, when fishing, by a violent storm. For eight months the poor fellows were at the mercy of the winds and currents on a sea now smooth, now rough. They had never throughout this time been without fish, but they had suffered the cruelest tortures from thirst. When their stock of rain-water, which they had used very sparingly, was exhausted, there was nothing left to them to do but to fling themselves into the sea and try to obtain at the bottom of the ocean some water less impregnated with salt, which they brought to the surface in cocoa-nut shells pierced with a small opening. When they reached the Aur Islands, even the sight of land and the immediate prospect of safety did not rouse them from the state of prostration into which they had sunk. The sight of the iron instruments in the canoe of the strangers led the people of Aur to decide on their massacre for the sake of their treasures; but the tamon, Tigedien by name, took them under his protection. Three years had passed since this event, and the men from the Caroline Islands, thanks to their more extended knowledge, soon acquired a certain ascendancy over their hosts.