ARRIVAL AT BORABORA.

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the north-west, at which there is a good entrance to a commodious harbour. As we struck into the lagoon, and rowed towards the beach, the descending sun had turned the waters to flame, and the towering rocks beyond into palaces and pinnacles, more superb in architecture, and richer in materials, than the visions of romance ever exhibited in fairyland. We disembarked at the pier, which has been carried out in a triangular form, having a middle path, with two sheets of water between the exterior walls, a quarter of a mile in length, towards the reef. This must have been reared at an immense expense of native labour, to heave the coral blocks out of their sub-marine quarries, and fix them in compact bulwarks within the domain of the deep. Mr. Orsmond, the Missionary, with a great concourse of people, was waiting to welcome us on the pier. Hither, be it recorded, by the mercy of God, we had been brought seventy miles in an open boat, without injury or mischance, though the death-shot had passed over our heads at our outset, and the shark had rushed from his ambush upon us by the way.

Jan. 29. Mr. Tyerman, with his companion Mr. Ellis, under the guidance of Mr. Orsmond, walked through the Missionary settlement, which extends two miles and a half along the shore, having a wide foot-path through the whole, formed by laying the trunks of cocoa-nut trees on either side, and filling up the space between with earth. The dwellings of the natives are built on both sides of this road, at convenient distances, all the way. Many of these are in the new style, wattled and plastered. The place of worship does great credit to the industry of the builders. It is seventy-five feet long by forty-five broad, and is most commodiously furnished with benches; the floor is lowest along the middle line, from each side of which it slopes