A New Voyage Round the World by a Course Never Sailed Before Part 20

To the lieutenant, now made captain 1000

To the mids.h.i.+pmen, now made lieutenants, each 500_l._ 1000

To fifty men, each 100_l._ 5000

To the surgeon 200_l._, and his servant 100_l._, over and above their 100_l._ as being part of the fifty men 300 ----- 7300

Having pitched upon the men, I landed them, and made them encamp on sh.o.r.e; but, first of all, I made them every one make wills or letters of attorney, or other dispositions, of their effects to such persons as they thought fit, with an account under their hands, endorsed on the back of the said wills, &c., intimating what chests or cases or other things they had on board, and what was in them, and what pay was due to them; and those chests, &c., were sealed up before their faces with my seal, and writings signed by me, the contents unknown. Thus they were secure that all they had left in the s.h.i.+ps, and all that was due to them, should be punctually and carefully kept and delivered as it was designed and directed by themselves, and this was greatly to their satisfaction.

As to the reward of one hundred pounds a man, and the articles about keeping together, obeying orders, gathering up gold, and the like, I did not read to them till they were all on sh.o.r.e, and till I was ready to leave them; because, if the rest of the men had heard it, I should have kept n.o.body with me to have sailed the s.h.i.+ps.

There was as stout a company of bold, young brisk fellows of them, as ever went upon any expedition, fifty-three in number; among them a surgeon and his mate, very skilful and honest men both of them, a trumpeter and a drummer, three s.h.i.+p-carpenters, a cook, who was also a butcher by trade, and a barber, two shoemakers who had been soldiers among the pirates, a smith, and a tailor of the same, so that they wanted no mechanics, whatever might happen to them.

Give the fellows their due, they took but little baggage with them; but, however, what they had, I took care, with the a.s.sistance of my patron, the Spaniard, should be as much carried for them as possible.

I provided them three large tents made of a cotton stuff, which I bought in the country, and which we made up on board, which tents were large enough to cover them all, in case of rain or heat; but as for beds or bedding, they had only seven hammocks, in case any man was sick; for the rest, they were to s.h.i.+ft as well as they could; the season was hot, and the climate good. Their way lay in the lat.i.tude of 40 to 50, and they set out in the latter end of the month of October, which, on that side of the line, is the same as our April; so that the covering was more to keep them from the heat than the cold.

It was needful, in order to their defence, to furnish them with arms and ammunition; so I gave to every man a musket or fuzee, a pistol, and a sword, with cartouches and a good stock of ammunition, powder and shot, with three small barrels of fine powder for store, and lead in proportion; and these things were, indeed, the heaviest part of their baggage, excepting the carpenters' tools and the surgeon's box of medicines.

As for the carrying all these things, they might easily furnish themselves with mules or horses for carriage, while they had money to pay for them, and you may judge how that could be wanting, by what has been said of the country.

We gave them, however, a good large pack of European goods, to make agreeable presents where they received favours; such as black baize, pieces of say, serge, calamanco, drugget, hats and stockings; not forgetting another pack of hatchets, knives, scissors, beads, toys, and such things, to please the natives of the plain country, if they should meet with any.

They desired a few hand granadoes, and we gave them about a dozen; but, as they were heavy, it would have been very troublesome to have carried more.

The Spaniard stayed till all this was done, and till the men were ready to march, and then told us privately, that it would not be proper for him to march along with them, or to appear openly to countenance the enterprise; that my two lieutenants knew the way perfectly well; and that he would go before to his own house, and they should hear of him by the way.

All the mules and horses which he had lent us to bring us back he left with them to carry their baggage, and our new captain had bought six more privately in the country.

The last instructions I gave to our men were, that they should make the best of their way over the country beyond the mountains; that they should take the exact distances of places, and keep a journal of their march, set up crosses and marks at all proper stations; and that they should steer their course as near as they could between the lat.i.tude of 40, where they would enter the country, and the lat.i.tude of 45 south, so that they would go an east-south-east course most of the way, and that wherever they made the sh.o.r.e they should seek for a creek or port where the s.h.i.+ps might come to an anchor, and look out night and day for the s.h.i.+ps; the signals also were agreed on, and they had two dozen of rockets to throw up if they discovered us at sea; they had all necessary instruments for observation also, and perspective gla.s.ses, pocket compa.s.ses, &c., and thus they set out, October 24th, 1715.

We stayed five days after they began their march, by agreement, that if any opposition should be offered them in the country, or any umbrage taken at their design, so that it could not be executed, we might have notice. But as the Spaniards in the country, who are the most supinely negligent people in the world, had not the least shadow of intelligence, and took them only to be French seamen belonging to the two French s.h.i.+ps (such we past for) who had lain there so long, they knew nothing when they went away, much less whither; but, no question, they believed that they were all gone aboard again.

We stayed three days longer than we appointed, and hearing nothing amiss from them, we were satisfied that all was right with them; so we put to sea, standing off to the west, till we were out of sight of the sh.o.r.e, and then we stood away due south, with a fresh gale at north-west-by-west, and fair weather, though the wind chopped about soon after, and we had calms and hot weather that did us no good, but made our men sick and lazy.

The supposed journey of our travellers, their march, and the adventures they should meet with by the way, were, indeed, sufficient diversion, and employed us all with discourse, as well in the great cabin and roundhouse as afore the mast, and wagers were very rife among us, who should come first to the sh.o.r.e of Patagonia, for so we called it.

As for the place, neither they nor we could make any guess at what part of the country they should make the sea; but, as for us, we resolved to make the port St. Julian our first place to put in at, which is in the lat.i.tude of 50 5' and that then, as wind and weather would permit, we would keep the coast as near as we could, till we came to Punta de St.

Helena, where we would ride for some time, and, if possible, till we heard of them.

We had but a cross voyage to the mouth of the Straits of Magellan, having contrary winds, as I have said, and sometimes bad weather; so that it was the 13th of December when we made an observation, and found ourselves in the lat.i.tude of 52 30', which is just the height of Cape Victoria, at the mouth of the pa.s.sage.

Some of our officers were very much for pa.s.sing the Straits, and not going about by Cape Horn; but the uncertainty of the winds in the pa.s.sage, the danger of the currents, &c., made it by no means advisable, so we resolved to keep good sea-room.

The 25th of December, we found ourselves in the lat.i.tude of 62 30', and being Christmas-day, I feasted the men, and drank the health of our travellers. Our course was south-east-by-south, the wind south-west; then we changed our course, and went east for eight days, and having changed our course, stood away, without observation, east-north-east, and in two days more, made the land, on the east of the Strait de la Mare, so that we were obliged to stand away east-south-east to take more sea-room, when the wind veering to the south-by-east, a fresh gale, we stood boldly away due north, and running large, soon found that we were entered into the North Sea on Twelfth Day; for joy of which, and to celebrate the day, I gave every mess a piece of English beef, and a piece of Chilian pork, and made a great bowl of punch afore the mast, as well as in the great cabin, which made our men very cheerful, and instead of a twelfth cake, I gave the cook order to make every mess a good plum-pudding, which pleased them all as well.

But while we were at our liquor and merry, the wind came about to the north-east and blew very hard, threatening us with a storm, and as the sh.o.r.e lay on our leeward quarter, we were not without apprehensions of being driven on some dangerous places, where we could have no shelter; I immediately therefore altered my course, and ran away east all night, to have as much sea-room as possible.

The next day the wind abated, and hauling away to the east, we stood northward again, and then north-west in three days more, and we made land, which appeared to be the head island of Port St. Julian, on the north side of the port, where we ran in, and about an hour before sunset came to an anchor in eleven fathom good holding ground, lat.i.tude 49 18'.

We wanted fresh water, otherwise we would not have made any stay here, for we knew we were a little too far to the south; however, we were obliged to fill fresh water here for three days together, the watering-place being a good way up the river, and the swell of the sea running very high.

During this interval, Captain Merlotte and I went on sh.o.r.e with about thirty men, and marched up the country near twenty miles, getting up to the top of the hills, where we made fires, and at the farthest hill we encamped all night, and threw up five rockets, which was our signal; but we saw nothing to answer it, nor any sign either of English people or natives in all the country.

We saw a n.o.ble champaign country, the plains all smooth, and covered with gra.s.s like Salisbury Plain; very little wood to be seen anywhere, insomuch that we could not get any thing but gra.s.s to make a smoke with, which was another of our signals.

We shot some fowls here, and five or six hares; the hares are as large as an English fox, and burrow in the earth like a rabbit. The fowls we shot were duck and mallard, teal and widgeon, the same as in England in shape and size, only the colour generally grey, with white in the breast, and green heads; the flesh the same as ours, and very good.

We saw wild geese and wild swans, but shot none; we saw also guinacoes, or Peruvian sheep, as big as small mules, but could not get at them; for as soon as we stepped toward them, they would call to one another, to give notice of us, and then troop altogether and be gone.

This is an excellent country for feeding and breeding of sheep and horses, the gra.s.s being short, but very sweet and good on the plains, and very long and rich near the fresh rivers, and were it cultivated and stocked with cattle, would without doubt produce excellent kinds of all sorts of cattle; nor could it fail producing excellent corn, as well wheat as barley and oats; and as for peas, they grow wild all over the country, and nourish an infinite number of birds resembling pigeons, which fly in flights so great, that they seem in the air like clouds at a great distance.

As for the soil, that of the hills is gravel, and some stony; but that of the plains is a light black mould, and in some places a rich loam, and some marl, all of which are tokens of fruitfulness, such as indeed never fail.

The 14th of January (the weather being hot, and days long, for this was their July), we weighed and stood northerly along the sh.o.r.e, the coast running from Port St. Julian north-north-east, until we arrived at the famous islands called Penguin Islands; and here we came to an anchor again, in the same round bay which Sir John Narborough called Port Desire, it being the 17th of January.

Here we found a post or cross, erected by Sir John Narborough, with a plate of copper nailed to it, and an inscription, signifying that he had taken possession of that country in the name of Charles the Second.

Our men raised a shout for joy that they were in their own king's dominions, or as they said, in their own country; and indeed, excepting that it was not inhabited by Englishmen, and cultivated, planted, and enclosed after the English manner, I never saw a country so much like England.

Here we victualled our s.h.i.+ps with a new kind of food, for we loaded ourselves with seals, of which here are an infinite number, and which we salted and ate, and our men liked them wonderfully for awhile, but they soon began to grow weary of them; also the penguins are a very wholesome diet, and very pleasant, especially when a little salted; and as for salt, we could have loaded our s.h.i.+ps with it, being very good and white, made by the sun, and found in standing ponds of salt water, near the sh.o.r.e.

The penguins are so easily killed, and are found in such vast mult.i.tudes on that island (which for that reason is so called), that our men loaded the long-boat with them twice in one day, and we reckoned there were no less than seven thousand in the boat each time.

Here we travelled up into the country in search of our men, and made our signals, but had no answer to them, nor heard any intelligence of them.

We saw some people here at a distance, scattering about; but they were but few, nor would they be brought by any means to converse with us, or come near us.

We spread ourselves over the country far and wide; and here we shot hares and wild-fowl again in abundance, the country being much the same as before, but something more bushy, and here and there a few trees, but they were a great way off. There is a large river which empties itself into this bay.

Finding no news here of our men, I ordered the Madagascar s.h.i.+p to weigh and stand farther north, keeping as near the sh.o.r.e as he might with safety, and causing his men to look out for the signals, which, if they discovered, they should give us notice by firing three guns.

They sailed the height of Cape Blanco, where the land falling back, makes a deep bay, and the sea receives into it a great river at several mouths, some of them twenty leagues from the other, all farther north.

Here they stood into the bay until they made the land again; for at the first opening of the bay they could not see the bottom of it, the land lying very low.

The captain was doubtful what he should do upon the appearance of so large a bay, and was loath to stand farther in, lest the land, pus.h.i.+ng out into the sea again afterwards, and a gale springing up from the seaward, they might be shut into a bay where they had no knowledge of the ground; and upon this caution, they resolved among themselves to come to an anchor for that evening, and to put farther out to sea the next morning.

Accordingly the next morning he weighed and stood off to sea; but the weather being very fine, and the little wind that blew being south-west-by-south, he ventured to stand in for the sh.o.r.e, where he found two or three small creeks, and one large river; and sending in his shallop to sound, and find out a good place to ride in, upon their making the signal to him that they had found such a place, he stood in, and came to an anchor in eleven fathom good ground, half a league from the sh.o.r.e, and well defended from the northerly and easterly winds, which were the winds we had any reason to fear.

Having thus brought his s.h.i.+p to an anchor, he sent his shallop along the sh.o.r.e to give me an account of it, and desire me to come up to him, which accordingly we did; and here we resolved to ride for some time, in hopes to hear from our little army.

We went on sh.o.r.e, some or other of us, every day, and especially when five of our men, going on sh.o.r.e on the north side of the river, had shot three Peruvian sheep and a black wild bull; for after that they ranged the country far and near to find more, but could never come within shot of them, except three bulls and a cow, which they killed after a long and tedious chase.

We lay here till the 16th of February, without any news of our travellers, as I called them. All the hopes we had was, that five of our men asking my leave to travel, swore to me they would go quite up to the Andes but they would find them; nay, they would go to the Spanish gentleman himself, if they did not hear of them; and obliged me to stay twenty days for them, and no longer. This I readily promised, and giving them everything they asked, and two Peruvian sheep to carry their ammunition, with two dozen of rockets for signals, a speaking trumpet, and a good perspective gla.s.s, away they went; and from them we had yet heard no news, so that was our present hope.

They travelled, as they afterwards gave an account, one hundred and twenty miles up the country, till they were at last forced to resolve to kill one of their guinacoes, or sheep, to satisfy their hunger, which was a great grief to them, for their luggage was heavy to carry; but, I say, they only resolved on it, for just as they were going to do it, one of them roused a deer with a fawn, and, by great good luck shot them both; for, having killed the doe, the fawn stood still by her till he had loaded his piece again, and shot that also.

This supplied them for four or five days plentifully, and the last day one of my men being by the bank of the river (for they kept as near the river as they could, in hopes to hear of them that way), saw something black come driving down the stream; he could not reach it, but calling one of his fellows, their curiosity was such, that the other, being a good swimmer, stripped and put off to it, and, when he came to it, he found it was a man's hat; this made them conclude their fellows were not far off, and that they were coming by water.