an was needful to take in fresh
water, but made the best of our way for the coast of Coromandel; we were
indeed informed that a French man of war of fifty guns and two large
merchant-ships were gone for the Indies; and as I knew we were at war
with France, I had some apprehensions of them; but they went their own
way, and we heard no more of them.

I shall not pester my account, or the reader, with descriptions of
places, journals of our voyages, variations of the compass, latitudes,
meridian distances, trade-winds, situation of ports, and the like; such
as almost all the histories of long navigation are full of, and which
make the reading tiresome enough, and are perfectly unprofitable to all
that read, except only to those who are to go to those places
themselves.

It is enough to name the ports and places which we touched at, and what
occurred to us upon our passing from one to another. We touched first at
the island of Madagascar, where, though the people are fierce and
treacherous, and, in particular, very well armed with lances and bows,
which they use with inconceivable dexterity, yet we fared very well with
them awhile; they treated us very civilly; and for some trifles which we
gave them, such as knives, scissors, &c. they brought us eleven good fat
bullocks, middling in size, but very good in flesh, which we took in,
partly for fresh provisions for our present spending, and the rest to
salt for the ship's use.

We were obliged to stay here for some time after we had furnished
ourselves with provisions; and I that was always too curious to look
into every nook of the world wherever I came, was for going on shore as
often as I could. It was on the east side of the island that we went on
shore one evening, and the people, who by the way are very numerous,
came thronging about us, and stood gazing at us at a distance; as we had
traded freely with them, and had been kindly used, we thought ourselves
in no danger; but when we saw the people we cut three boughs out of a
tree, and stuck them up at a distance from us, which, it seems, is a
mark in the country not only of truce and friendship, but when it is
accepted, the other side set up three poles or boughs also, which is a
signal that they accept the truce too; but then this is a known
condition of the truce, that you are not to pass beyond their three
poles towards them, nor they come past your three poles or boughs
towards you; so that you are perfectly secure