By the early 1800s, when French and Russian naval ships came to explore the Pacific, East and West had not yet come to know one another. Islanders and Europeans were both surprised at what they saw. While Micronesians told amusing stories of their encounters, officers on the naval ships took up pens to sketch what they found. Their drawings often depicted what they expected to find as much as what they actually saw. Later versions usually departed even further from reality. These are representations of some of the first encounters between islanders and Westerners.