“Te Kotore O Te Whenua.”

There are three small streams of water here, one of which finds its way to the sea through the natural arch above-described. The arch (called by the natives “Te Kotore o te Whenua”) pierces the ridge, the extremity of which forms the western head of the cove, and is about 400 yards from high-water mark within the cove. The measurements given by Cook do not quite correspond with the present dimensions. The present length is 55 feet, the breadth at the narrowest part 24½ feet, and the height at the lowest part 23 feet. The length has probably been reduced by the falling away of the cliff at the other end, at which part also the measurements of the height and breadth given by Cook may have been estimated.

About thirty yards from high-water mark, among some bushes, about 20 feet up the side of the same hill as that in which the arch occurs, is what is known as “Cook's well.” This is a small hole, about 10 inches in diameter and about one foot deep, excavated in the soft rock where a tiny rill trickles down from a small spring a little higher up the hill. This could not have been used in any way for watering the ship, but was probably hollowed out for amusement by some of the boys in the ship's company. That it is not a natural cavity, but that it was made on the page break page 12 occasion of Cook's visit, seems to be satisfactorily shown by the name which the natives have given it—viz., “Te Wai Keri a Tepaea” or “Tepaea's well”; Tepaea (in which form they have preserved the name of the Tahitian “Tupaea”) having been thought by them to have been the name of Captain Cook. Various letters have been cut near the little well, but most of them have become very indistinct from the scaling-off or the surface of the rock. It is impossible to assign any date to these, which may, all of them, be much more modern than 1769.

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