At last a bay--the celebrated Botany Bay, as it was subsequently named--opened before the _Endeavour_. The astonished natives appeared again on the beach, gazing at the ship as she slowly made her way into sheltered waters. They were absolutely naked, but their faces were dusted over with a white powder, and their bodies were painted in stripes of the same colour, which, passing obliquely over their breasts and backs, appeared like the belts worn crosswise in those days by British soldiers. Similar streaks were drawn round their legs and thighs like broad garters. They were armed with long wooden pikes, and "a wooden weapon shaped somewhat like a scimitar". This was the celebrated boomerang, the curved or crooked flat piece of wood which was one of Man's earliest weapons. Hurled by a practised hand it will whirl through the air, and unless it strikes the object aimed at with its sharp, flat edge, it returns almost to the spot from which it has been thrown. The boomerang has been in use at one time or another from West Africa to east Australia, and was once used in ancient Egypt. Reproduced in metal it is the origin of the throwing-knife of North Central Africa. On Saturday, 28 April, 1770, the _Endeavour_ anchored in Botany Bay, abreast of a small village consisting of six or eight houses. As the sailors were preparing to hoist out the boat they saw an old man, followed by three children, come out of the forest carrying firewood, and each of the children had also its little burden. Other children came out to meet them, and all alike gazed at the ship without either fear or surprise. The women set to work to kindle a fire, and four canoes came in from fishing. The men landed, and, having hauled up their boats, began to dress their dinner, to all appearance wholly unconcerned about this wonderful arrival, though the _Endeavour_ was anchored within half a mile of them. As soon, however, as Cook and his party landed, two men of the native Australians came down to dispute their landing, whilst the others ran away. Each of these men was armed with a wooden lance about 10 feet long, and a short stick. They called out to the white men in a very loud tone in a hard, dissonant language, which neither the Englishmen nor Tupia, their Polynesian interpreter, understood in the least. They brandished their weapons and seemed resolved to defend their coast to the uttermost, though they were but two and the white men forty in number. Unwilling to provoke hostilities, Cook ordered the boat to lie upon her oars, and commenced to parley by signs, and to bespeak the goodwill of these stark-naked savages, throwing them at the same time nails, beads, and other trifles, which they took up and seemed to be well pleased with.