rable breeze springing up, the
sail was hoisted, and as the boat moved under its influence, the haze
grew in consistency and size. Land was in sight.

The reader may perhaps smile with contempt at the superstitious faith of
Botello and companions in the connection between this happy land-fall
and their ingenious compulsion of the saint's miraculous power; but it
may be questioned whether there was not good ground for their belief--at
least as good ground as there is for faith in any of the facts of animal
magnetism, clairvoyance, and spiritual rappings.

The land proved to be a point in Lagoa Bay--a familiar object to
Botello. Upon going ashore, a party of natives received him, with whom
friendly relations were soon established, and from whom provisions and
water were readily obtained. A few days served to recruit the exhausted
strength of the party, when taking again to their boat, they coasted
along the shore, landing at frequent intervals, until they reached the
dreaded Cape of Storms, as the southern point of Africa was called by
its first discoverer, Bartholomew Diaz.

The Cape did not belie its reputation. From the summit of Table
Mountain, and the surrounding high lands, it sent down a gust that drove
the unfortunate voyageurs away from the land a long distance to the
south-west; and many weary and despairing days were passed before they
were able to make the harbor of Saldahana. Here the chief necessity of
life--fresh water--was found in abundance, and a supply of provisions
obtained, consisting chiefly of the dried flesh of seals, with which the
harbor was filled. A few orange and lemon-trees, planted by the early
Portuguese discoverers, were loaded with fruit, and afforded a grateful
and effectual means of removing the symptoms of scurvy which were
beginning to appear.

Saldahana being a resting place for the outward bound Portuguese fleets,
Botello made his stay as short as possible, lest he should be
intercepted and turned back by some newly appointed and jealous viceroy.
For the same reason he avoided several points on the coast of western
Africa where his countrymen had stations--keeping well out to sea and
from the mouth of the Congo, and steering a direct course across the
Gulf of Guinea. He knew that if a Portuguese admiral had sailed at the
appointed time, he must be somewhere in that Gulf, and that his tall
barks would hug the shore, creeping from headland to headland slowly and
cautiously. The en