at first to threaten the colony with a loss that must have been for some
time severely felt; but which was succeeded by an opening of that
amicable intercourse with these people which the governor had always
laboured to establish, and which was at last purchased by a most
unpleasant accident to himself, and at the risk of his life.

The governor, who had uniformly directed every undertaking in person
since the formation of the colony, went down in the morning of the 7th to
the South Head, accompanied by Captain Collins and Lieutenant Waterhouse,
to give some instructions to the people employed in erecting a column at
that place. As he was returning to the settlement, he received
information, by a boat which had landed Mr. White and some other
gentlemen in the lower part of the harbour (they were going on an
excursion towards Broken Bay) that Bennillong had been seen there by Mr.
White, and had sent the governor as a present a piece of the whale which
was then lying in the wash of the surf on the beach. Anxious to see him
again, the governor, after taking some arms from the party at the
Look-out, which he thought the more requisite in this visit as he heard
the cove was full of natives, went down and landed at the place where the
whale was lying. Here he not only saw Bennillong, but Cole-be also, who
had made his escape from the governor's house a few days after his
capture. At first his excellency trusted himself alone with these people;
but the few months Bennillong had been away had so altered his person,
that the governor, until joined by Mr. Collins and Mr. Waterhouse, did
not perfectly recollect his old acquaintance. Bennillong had been always
much attached to Mr. Collins, and testified with much warmth his
satisfaction at seeing him again. Several articles of wearing apparel
were now given to him and his companions (taken for that purpose from the
people in the boat, who, all but one man, remained on their oars to be
ready in case of any accident), and a promise was exacted from the