The gleam of joy which this unhappy family derived from the
circumstance, which had been related to them, of young Heywood's
swimming off to the _Pandora_, was dissipated by a letter from himself
to his mother, soon after his arrival in England, in which he
says:--'The question, my dear mother, in one of your letters,
concerning my swimming off to the _Pandora_, is one falsity among the
too many, in which I have often thought of undeceiving you, and as
frequently forgot. The story was this:--On the morning she arrived,
accompanied by two of my friends (natives), I was going up the
mountains, and having got about a hundred yards from my own house,
another of my friends (for I was an universal favourite among those
Indians, and perfectly conversant in their language) came running after
me, and informed me there was a ship coming. I immediately ascended a
rising ground, and saw, with indescribable joy, a ship laying-to off
Hapiano; it was just after daylight, and thinking Coleman might not be
awake, and therefore ignorant of this pleasing news, I sent one of my
servants to inform him of it, upon which he immediately went off in a
single canoe. There was a fresh breeze, and the ship working into the
bay; he no sooner got alongside than the rippling capsized the canoe,
and he being obliged to let go the tow-rope to get her righted, went
astern, and was picked up the next tack and taken on board the
_Pandora_, he being the first person. I, along with my messmate Stewart,
was then standing upon the beach with a double canoe, manned with twelve
paddles ready for launching; and just as she made her last tack into her
berth (for we did not think it requisite to go off sooner), we put off
and got alongside just as they streamed the buoy; and being dressed in
the country manner, tanned as brown as themselves, and I _tattooed_ like
them in the most curious manner, I do not in the least wonder at their
taking us for natives. I was tattooed, not to gratify my own desire, but
theirs; for it was my constant endeavour to acquiesce in any little
custom which I thought would be agreeable to them, though painful in the
process, provided I gained by it their friendship and esteem, which you
may suppose is no inconsiderable object in an island where the natives
are so numerous. The more a man or woman there is tattooed, the more
they are respected; and a person having none of these marks is looked
upon as bearing an unworthy badge of disgrace, and considered as a mere
outcast of society.'
Among the many anxious friends and family connexions of the Heywoods,
was Commodore Pasley, to whom this affectionate young lady addressed
herself on the melancholy occasion; and the following is the reply she
received from this officer.
'_Sheerness, June 8th_, 1792.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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