Passing by Osnaburg Island, already discovered by Captain Wallis, Cook reached Tahiti (which at once struck them in its difference from the atoll islands by being high and mountainous) on 12 April, 1769. Before even he could get near the shore his ship was surrounded by canoes, in which there were bunches of bananas and branches of a tree, which it was the custom of these people to wave as a token of peace and amity. By signs they expressed the wish that these branches should be stuck amongst the rigging of the ship as a sign that they would be received with friendliness. This having been done, the canoes approached the ship close enough to hand their cargoes of coconuts, bananas, and other fruit on board, where it was eagerly purchased by the sailors, being extremely acceptable after their long privation from such additions to their diet. The next day the ship came to an anchor in Port Royal Bay (Matavai). Here the first thing that attracted their attention, when the natives came off to trade, was the bread-fruit.[73] [73] See pp. 64 and 160. Before anyone from the _Endeavour_ was allowed to land at Tahiti, Cook wisely drew up rules to guide the relations of the seamen and officers with the natives, in order as far as possible to avoid provoking quarrels with them, or enabling the latter to acquire weapons which might be turned against the white men. Landing himself, with Banks and Dr. Solander, a party of armed seamen, and a native of Tahiti, who had come off to the ship and constituted himself their guide, he noticed that the Polynesian people were so awestruck that the first who approached them almost came creeping on his hands and knees. Leafy boughs having been offered in token of peace, the Englishmen likewise broke off green branches and held them in their hands, and, the whole party having marched to a place where there was a freshwater spring and where the ground was clean and bare, green boughs were dropped by both sides in a regular heap, and after that relations between them became much less formal, especially after Cook's party had distributed beads and other small presents. They walked for about 5 miles through groves of trees loaded with coconuts and bread-fruit, and offering the most grateful shade. Under the trees were the houses of the natives, most of them being only a roof without walls, and the whole scene realizing "the poetical fables of Arcadia".