Читать книгу Mutiny on the Bounty. Historical Novel онлайн

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The entrance to the bay bore southwest by west, little more than a league distant, and a great number of canoes were now putting out to us. Most of them were small, holding only four or five persons; strange-looking craft, with an outrigger on the larboard side and a high stern sweeping up in a shape almost semicircular. There were two or three double canoes among them, each holding thirty or more people. The Indian craft approached us rapidly. Their paddlers took half a dozen short quick strokes on one side, and then, at a signal from the man astern, all shifted to the other side. As the leading canoes drew near, I heard questioning shouts: “Taio? Peritane? Rima?” which is to say: “Friend? British? Lima?” In the latter case, they were asking whether the Bounty was a Spanish ship from Peru. “Taio!” shouted Bligh, who knew some words of the Tahitian language. “Taio! Peritane!” Next moment the first boatload of Indians came springing over the bulwarks, and I had my first glimpse at close quarters of this far-famed race.