bad steerage, a bad
account, or a current, I could not determine; but was apt to judge it
might be a complication of all; for I could not think it was wholly the
current, the land here lying east-by-south, and west-by-north, or a
little more northerly and southerly. We had kept so nigh as to see it,
and at farthest had not been above twenty leagues from it, but sometimes
much nearer; and it is not probable that any current should set directly
off from a land. A tide indeed may; but then the flood has the same
force to strike in upon the shore, as the ebb to strike off from it: but
a current must have set nearly along shore, either easterly or westerly;
and if anything northerly or southerly, it could be but very little in
comparison of its east or west course, on a coast lying as this doth;
which yet we did not perceive. If therefore we were deceived by a
current, it is very probable that the land is here disjoined, and that
there is a passage through to the southward, and that the land from King
William's Cape to this place is an island, separated from New Guinea by
some strait, as Nova Britannia is by that which we came through. But
this being at best but a probable conjecture, I shall insist no farther
upon it.

The 14th we passed by Scouten's Island, and Providence Island, and found
still a very strong current setting to the north-west. On the 17th we
saw a high mountain on the main, that sent forth great quantities of
smoke from its top: this volcano we did not see in our voyage out. In
the afternoon we discovered King William's Island, and crowded all the
sail we could to get near it before night, thinking to lie to the
eastward of it till day, for fear of some shoals that lie at the west end
of it. Before night we got within two leagues of it, and having a fine
gale of wind and a light moon, I resolved to pass through in the night,
which I hoped to do before twelve o'clock, if the gale continued; but
when we came within two miles of it, it fell calm: yet afterwards by the
help of the current, a small gale, and our boat, we got through before
day. In the night we had a very fragrant smell from the island. By
morning light we were got two leagues to the westward of it; and then
were becalmed all the morning; and met such whirling tides, that when we
came into them, the ship turned quite round: and though sometimes we had
a small gale of wind, yet she could not feel the helm when she came into
these whirlpo