y saved himself and his ship, and such of the crew
as had chosen to submit to his orders. But it is a long history, and
will not admit of being curtailed. As an instance of the stuff of which
it was composed, he ran back in the black night in a gale of wind
through the Straits of Magellan, _by a chart which he had made with the
eye in passing up_. His anchors were lost or broken; the cables were
parted. He could not bring up the ship; there was nothing for it but to
run, and he carried her safe through along a channel often not three
miles broad, sixty miles from end to end, and twisting like the reaches
of a river.

For the present, however, we are forced to content ourselves with a few
sketches out of the north-west voyages. Here is one, for instance, which
shows how an Englishman could deal with the Indians. Davis had landed at
Gilbert's Sound, and gone up the country exploring. On his return he
found his crew loud in complaints of the thievish propensities of the
natives, and urgent to have an example made of some of them. On the next
occasion he fired a gun at them with blank cartridge; but their nature
was still too strong for them.

Seeing iron (he says), they could in no case forbear stealing;
which, when I perceived, it did but minister to me occasion of
laughter to see their simplicity, and I willed that they should not
be hardly used, but that our company should be more diligent to keep
their things, supposing it to be very hard in so short a time to
make them know their evils.

In his own way, however, he took an opportunity of administering a
lesson to them of a more wholesome kind than could be given with
gunpowder and bullets. Like the rest his countrymen, he believed the
savage Indians in their idolatries to be worshippers of the devil. 'They
are witches,' he says; 'they have images in great store, and use many
kinds of enchantments.' And these enchantments they tried on one
occasion to put in force against himself and his crew.

Being on shore on the 4th day of July, one of them made a long
oration, and then kindled a fire, into which with many strange words
and gestures he put divers things, which we supposed to be a
sacrifice. Myself and certain of my company standing by, they
desired us to go into the smoke. I desired them to go into the
smoke, which they would by no means do. I then took one of them and
thrust him into the smoke, and willed one