ed for aiding his own ship, so
that I had to go in another boat with only four or five men, the admiral
engaging to restore my own when I had found a harbour. I made the best of
my way to the island, from which we were now only four leagues, and soon
found an excellent harbour which could have contained our whole fleet. I
remained here eight days, anxiously looking for the arrival of the admiral
and our squadron, whose non-appearance gave me great uneasiness, and so
greatly dismayed the people who were with me that they were reduced almost
to despair. While in this forlorn condition, we espied on the eighth day a
sail on the horizon, and went off immediately in our boat to meet them,
hopeful that they would take us to a better port. On getting up with this
vessel, we were informed that the admirals ship, which we had left in
great danger, had gone to the bottom. This melancholy intelligence gave us
vast uneasiness, as we were 1000 leagues from Lisbon. But putting our
trust in Providence, we returned with the ship to the before-mentioned
island, on purpose to take in wood and water for the voyage.

This island was wild and uninhabited, but had many pleasant rills of
excellent water, with great abundance of trees, and prodigious numbers
both of land and water-fowl, which were so tame, from being unaccustomed
to man, that they allowed themselves to be caught by hand, so that we
caught as many as filled one of our boats. The only quadrupeds were large
rats, and lizards having forked tails, besides which there were several
serpents. Having taken in such refreshments as the island afforded, we set
sail on a S.S.W. course, the king having ordered us to follow the same
direction we had pursued in our preceding voyage. We at length reached a
port, to which we gave the name of the Bay of all Saints[8], which we
reached in seventeen days sail, being favoured with a fair wind, although
300 leagues distance from the before-mentioned island[9]. Although we
waited here two months and four days, we were not joined by any of the
ships belonging to our squadron. It was therefore agreed upon between the
master and me to proceed farther along this coast, which we did
accordingly for 260 leagues to a certain harbour, where we determined upon
erecting a fort, in which we left twenty-four of our men who had been
saved out of the admirals ship[10]. We remained five months at this
harbour, occupied in building the fort, and in loading our ships w