On the 20th of September, in latitude seven degrees fifty minutes south, and longitude one hundred and twenty degrees thirty minutes west, we saw a comet for the first time, thirty or forty degrees above the horizon, and bearing from us east by north. At day-light, on the morning of September 26th, several of the southernmost of the Marqueses were in sight. They were all mountainous, but covered with vegetation, and as we drew near presented a pleasing contrast to the sterile and gloomy Gallapagos. We stood along the shore of La Dominica, admiring the beautiful little valleys that were presented to our view in quick succession, where villages of palm-thatched huts, surrounded by clumps of tall cocoa-nut and wide-spreading bread fruit trees, formed scenes of rural quiet calculated to fill the imagination with the most agreeable conceptions of the happy condition of their inhabitants. At length we came to a small bay where the valley was more populous than any we had seen before, and the captain, to our great satisfaction, hauled up for it and stood close in towards the island. We lowered a boat, and providing ourselves with a few trifles for presents, pulled into the bay within a few yards of the shore. The beach was already thronged with people of all ages, male and female, who invited us to land by the most significant gestures, whilst many of them were singing and dancing to express their joy. The surrounding rocks and hills were covered with groups of females, gaily decked off with their neat head-dresses of the white Tapa cloth and many-coloured robes, which were floating in the wind, half concealing and half exposing their fantastically painted limbs. When they saw that we would not land, the men and boys dashed into the water with whatever they had to offer us, and swam off to the boat. A chief, who had a dry wreath of cocoa-nut around his brows, came off with them; and, upon being invited, got into the boat, where he remained until our departure, apparently giving orders from time to time to those who were passing and repassing from the shore to the boat. In a few minutes, they had presented us with a considerable quantity of cocoa-nuts, bananas, and papayas, for which we gave them in return a few trifling articles, the most valuable of which were glass beads. The chief had his eyes constantly fixed upon our fire-arms, and finally gave us to understand, by motions, that a pistol would be acceptable to him. With this intimation we could not comply; but he bore the refusal with great good nature, and for some time after our store of little presents was exhausted, his people continued to bring us off fruit without the expectation of any return. When they found that we were serious in our refusal to land, the women came from the hills and assembled on the rocks close to us, where, in a nearer view, they could display their persons to more advantage, and charm us with the melody of their voices.