to that country
as more profitable. This island, however, might maintain a good many
people, and is capable of being made so strong that they could not be
easily dislodged.

We got our smith's forge ashore on the 3d February, and set our coopers
to work to repair our water casks. They made a little tent also for me
on shore, to enjoy the benefit of the land air. The two ships also set
up tents for their sick, so that we had presently a kind of small town,
in which all who were able were busily employed. A few men supplied us
with excellent fish, in such abundance that they could take as many in a
few hours as would serve 200 men for a meal. There were some sea-fowl in
the bay, as large as geese, but they eat fishy. The governor, for so we
called Mr Selkirk, never failed to procure us two or three goats every
day for our sick men, by which, with the help of cabbages and other
vegetables, and the wholesome air, our men soon recovered from the
scurvy, and we found this island exceedingly agreeable, the weather
being neither too hot nor too cold. We spent our time till the 10th in
refitting our ships, taking wood on board, and laying in a stock of
water, that which we brought from England, St Vincents, and Isla Grande,
being spoilt by the badness of our casks. We also boiled up and refined
eighty gallons of oil of sea-lions, which we used in lamps to save
candles, and might have prepared several tons, if we had been provided
with vessels. The sailors sometimes used this oil to fry their fish, for
want of butter, and found it sufficiently agreeable. The men who worked
ashore in repairing our rigging, eat the young seals, which they
preferred to our ship's provisions, alleging that it was as good as
English lamb. We made all the haste we could to get every thing on
board, as we learnt at the Canaries that five stout French privateers
were coming in company into the South Sea.

This island of Juan Fernandez is about fifteen English miles in length
from E. to W. and five miles where broadest, but averaging little more
than two miles in breadth, and is mostly composed of high rugged land. I
know of nothing in its neighbourhood which may endanger a ship, except
what is distinctly visible. We anchored in the great bay, [La Baia or
Cumberland harbour] on the N.E. side, about a mile from the bottom of
the bay, our best bower being dropt in forty fathoms, and the stream
anchor carried in with the shore, where it was laid in about th