"On Thursday, 6th August, 1872, anchored in Makira Bay.... With Mr. Perry, a resident of Makira, and Wapenoco, the chief of the Makira tribe, and four South Sea islanders as a boat's crew, I went out to shoot rabbits at an island not far from the harbour. In leaving the bay we met with several large war-canoes, and pulling alongside one of them, found it to contain a dead body, dressed and cooked whole. Perry took it quite coolly, as an every-day occurrence; and at seeing me greatly horrified, and my boat's crew with their stomachs turned, said that he had seen as many as twenty bodies lying on the beach, dressed and cooked. Those in the war-canoe had two prisoners with them in it – a boy about 14, and a girl 13 years of age. Intending to save their lives, I offered to buy them, but without avail. The blacks went to Makira, sold half of the body there, and the remainder to another tribe, and sold both the prisoners. In the course of time I came across two houses, in which were kept the skulls of those they had eaten. I saw a considerable number of them."