But though these were valuable discoveries, yet, when I began to cast up the account in a more serious manner, they appeared to have no relation to, or coherence with, our intended voyage, or with the design of our employers, which we were to consider in the first place, for though it is true that we were encouraged to make all such kinds of useful discoveries as might tend to the advantage of trade, and the improvement of geographical knowledge and experience, yet it was all to be so directed as to be subservient to the profits and advantages of a trading and cruising voyage.
It is true that these northern discoveries might be infinitely great, and most glorious to the British nation, by opening new sources of wealth and commerce in general: yet, as I have said, it was evident that they tended directly to destroy the voyage, either as to trading or to cruising, and might perhaps end in our own destruction also. For example, first of all, if adventuring into those northern seas, we should, by our industry, make out the discovery, and find a pa.s.sage, either east or west, we must follow the discovery so as to venture quite through, or else we could not be sure that it was really a discovery; for these pa.s.sages would not be like doubling Cape de Bon Esperance, on the point of Africa, or going round Cape Horn, the southernmost point of America, either of which were compa.s.sed in a few days, and then immediately gave an opening into the Indian or Southern Oceans, where good weather and certain refreshment were to be had.
Whereas, for the discovery in the north, after having pa.s.sed the northernmost land of Grand Tartary, in the lat.i.tude of 74 even to 80, and perhaps to the very north pole, there must be a run west, beyond the most northerly point of Nova Zembla, and on again west-south-west, about the North Kyn and North Cape, about six hundred leagues, before we could come to have any relief of the climate; after that, one hundred and sixty leagues more, and even to Shetland and the north of Scotland, before we could meet with any relief of provisions, which, after the length we must have run, from the lat.i.tude of 3, where we now were at the Philippine Islands, to 74 north, being near five thousand miles, would be impossible to be done, unless we were sure to victual, and furnish ourselves again with provisions and water by the way, and that in several places.
As to the other pa.s.sage east, towards the continent of America, we had this uncertainty also; namely, that it was not yet discovered whether the land of California was an island or a continent, and if it should prove the latter, so as that we should be obliged to come back to the west, and not be able to find an opening between California and the land of north America, so as to come away to the coast of Mexico, to Acapulco, and so into the South Sea, and at the same time should not find a pa.s.sage through Hudson"s Bay, &c., into the North Sea, and so to Europe, we should not only spoil the voyage that way also, but should infallibly perish by the severity of the season and want of provisions.
All these things argued against any attempt that way; whereas, on the other hand, for southern discoveries, we had this particular encouragement; that whatever disappointment we might meet with, in the search after unknown countries, yet we were sure of an open sea behind us; and that whenever we thought fit to run south beyond the tropic, we should find innumerable islands where we might get water, and some sort of provisions, or come back into a favourable climate, and have the benefit of the trade winds, to carry us either backward or forward, as the season should happen to guide us.
Last of all, we had this a.s.surance, that, the dangers of the seas excepted, we were sure of an outlet before us, if we went forward, or behind us, if we were forced back; and, having a rich cargo, if we were to do nothing but go home, we should be able to give our employers such an account of ourselves, as that they would be very far from being losers by the voyage; but that, if we reached safe the coast of New Spain, and met with an open commerce there, as we expected, we should perhaps make the most prosperous voyage that was ever made round the globe before.
These considerations put an end to all my thoughts of going northward; some of our secret council, (for, by the way, we consulted our foremast men no more, but had a secret council among ourselves, the resolutions of which we solemnly engaged not to disclose); some of these, I say, were for steering the usual course, from the Philippines to New Spain, viz., keeping in the lat.i.tudes of 11 or 13 north the line, and so making directly for California; in which lat.i.tude they proposed that we might, perhaps, by cruising thereabout, meet with the Manilla ships, going from New Spain to Manilla, which we might take as prizes, and then stand directly for the coast of Peru. But I opposed this, princ.i.p.ally because it would effectually overthrow all my meditated discoveries to the southward; and, secondly, because I had observed, that, on the north of the line, there are no islands to be met with, in all the long run of near two thousand leagues, from Guam, one of the Ladrones, to the land of California; and that we did not find we were able to subsist during so long a run, especially for want of water; whereas, on the south of the line, as well within the tropic as without, we were sure to meet with islands innumerable, and that even all the way; so that we were sure of frequent relief of fresh water, of plants, fowl, and fish, if not of bread and flesh, almost all the way.
This was a main consideration to our men, and so we soon resolved to take the southern course; yet, as I said, we stood away for the Ladrones first. These are a cl.u.s.ter of islands, which lie in about 11 to 13 north lat.i.tude, north-east from the Moluccas, or Spice Islands, and east and by north from that part of the Philippines where we were, and at the distance of about four hundred leagues, and all the ships which go or come between the Philippines and New Spain touch at them, for the convenience of provisions, water, &c.; those that go to Spain put in there, in order to recruit and furnish for, and those that come from Spain, to relieve themselves after so long a run as that of six thousand miles, for so much it is at least from Guam to Acapulco; on these accounts, and with these reasonings, we came to the isles of the Ladrones.
During our run between the Philippine and Ladrone islands, we lived wholly upon our fresh provisions, of which we laid in a great stock at Manilla, such as hogs, fowls, calves, and six or seven cows, all alive, so that our English beef and pork, which lay well stored, was not touched for a long time.
At the Ladrones we recruited, and particularly took on board, as well alive as pickled up, near two hundred hogs, with a vast store of roots, and such things as are their usual food in that country. We took in also above three thousand cocoa-nuts and cabbages; yams, potatoes, and other roots, for our own use; and, in particular, we got a large quant.i.ty of maize, or Indian wheat, for bread, and some rice.
We stored ourselves likewise with oranges and lemons; and, buying a great quant.i.ty of very good limes, we made three or four hogsheads of lime-juice, which was a great relief to our men in the hot season, to mix with their water; as for making punch, we had some arrack and some sugar, but neither of them in such quant.i.ty as to have much punch made afore the mast.
We were eighteen days on our pa.s.sage from the Strait of Mindora to Guam, and stayed six days at the latter, furnishing ourselves with provisions, appearing all this while with French colours, and Captain Merlotte as commander. However we made no great ceremony here with the Spanish governor, as I have said already, only that Captain Merlotte, after we had been here two days, sent a letter to him by a French officer, who, showing his commission from the king of France, the governor presently gave us product, as we call it, and leave to buy what provisions we wanted.
In compliment for this civility, we sent the governor a small present of fine scarlet camlet and two pieces of baize; and he made a very handsome return, in such refreshments as he thought we most wanted.
There was another reason for our keeping in this lat.i.tude till we came to the Ladrones; namely, that all the southern side of that part of the way, between the Philippines and the Ladrones, is so full of islands, that, unless we had been provided with very good pilots, it would have been extremely hazardous; and, add to this, that, beyond these islands south, is no pa.s.sage; the land, which they call Nova Guinea, lying away east and east-south-east, farther than has yet been discovered; so that it is not yet known whether that country be an island or the continent.
Having for all these reasons gone to the Ladrones, and being sufficiently satisfied in our reasons for going away from thence to the southward, and having stored ourselves, as above, with whatever those islands produced, we left the Ladrones the 10th day of September in the evening, and stood away east-south-east, with the wind north-north-west, a fresh gale; after this, I think it was about five days, when, having stretched, by our account, about a hundred and fifty leagues, we steered away more to the southward, our course south-east-by-south.
And now, if ever, I expected to do something by way of discovery. I knew very well there were few, if any, had ever steered that course; or that, if they had, they had given very little account of their travels. The only persons who leave anything worth notice being Cornelius Vanschouten and Francis Le Mare, who, though they sailed very much to the south, yet say little to the purpose, as I shall presently show.
The sixteenth day after we parted from the Ladrones, being, by observation, in the lat.i.tude of 17 south of the line, one of our men cried, A sail! a sail! which put us into some fit of wonder, knowing nothing of a ship of any bulk could be met with in those seas; but our fit of wonder was soon turned to a fit of laughter, when one of our men from the foretop, cried out, Land! which, indeed, was the case; and the first sailor was sufficiently laughed at for his mistake, though, giving him his due, it looked at first as like a sail as ever any land at a distance could look.
Towards evening we made the land very plain, distance about seven leagues south-by-east, and found that it was not an island, but a vast tract of land, extended, as we had reason to believe, from the side of Gilolo, and the Spice Islands, or that which we call Nova Guinea, and never yet fully discovered. The land lying away from the west-north-west to the south-east-by-south, still southerly.
I, that was for making all possible discovery, was willing, besides the convenience of water, and perhaps fresh provisions, to put in here, and see what kind of country it was; so I ordered the brigantine to stand in for the sh.o.r.e. They sounded, but found no ground within half a league of the sh.o.r.e; so they hoisted out their boat, and went close in with the sh.o.r.e, where they found good anchor-hold in about thirty-six fathom, and a large creek, or mouth of a river; here they found eleven to thirteen fathom soft oozy sand, and the water half fresh at the mouth of the creek.
Upon notice of this, we stood in, and came all to an anchor in the very creek; and, sending our boats up the creek, found the water perfectly fresh and very good upon the ebb, about a league up the river.
Among all the islands in this part of the world, that is to say, from the Philippines eastward, of which there are an infinite number, we never came near any but we found ourselves surrounded with canoes and a variety of boats, bringing off to us cocoa-nuts, plantains, roots, and greens, to traffic for such things as they could get; and that in such numbers, we were tired with them, and sometimes alarmed, and obliged to fire at them. But here, though we saw great numbers of people at a distance from the sh.o.r.e, yet we saw not one boat or bark, nor anything else upon the water.
We stayed two or three days taking in fresh water, but it was impossible to restrain our men from going on sh.o.r.e, to see what sort of a country it was; and I was very willing they should do so. Accordingly, two of our boats, with about thirty men in both of them, went on sh.o.r.e on the east side of the creek or harbour where our ship lay.
They found the country looked wild and savage; but, though they could find no houses, or speak with the inhabitants, they saw their footsteps and their seats where they had sat down under some trees; and after wandering about a little, they saw people, both men and women, at a distance; but they ran away from our men, at first sight, like frightened deer; nor could they make any signal to them to be understood; for when our men hallooed and called after them, they ran again as if they had been bewitched.
Our men gathered a great variety of green stuff, though they knew not of what kind, and brought it all on board, and we eat a great deal of it; some we boiled and made broth of, and some of our men, who had the scurvy, found it did them a great deal of good; for the herbs were of a spicy kind, and had a most pleasant agreeable taste: but none of us could tell what to call them, though we had several men on board who had been among the Spice Islands before in Dutch ships.
We were very uneasy that we could get nothing here but a little gra.s.s and potherbs, as our men called it, and the men importuned me to let them have two boats, and go up the river as high as the tide would carry them; this I consented to, being as willing to make the discovery as they; so I ordered the captain of the Madagascar ship, who had, as I have said, been formerly my second mate, to go along with them.
But in the morning, a little before the flood was made, I was called out of my cabin to see an army, as they told me, coming to attack us. I turned out hastily enough, as may be easily conjectured, and such an army appeared as no ship was ever attacked with; for we spied three or four hundred black creatures, come playing and tumbling down the stream towards us, like so many porpoises in the water. I was not satisfied at first that they were human creatures, but would have persuaded our men, that they were sea-monsters, or fishes of some strange kind.
But they quickly undeceived us, for they came swimming about our ships, staring and wondering and calling to one another, but said not one word to us, at least, if they did, we could not understand them.
Some of them came very near our ships, and we made signs to them to come on board, but they would not venture. We tossed one of them a rope, and he took hold of it boldly; but as soon as we offered to pull, he let go, and laughed at us; another of them did the like, and when he let go, turned up his black b.u.t.tocks, as in sport at us; the language of which, in our country, we all knew, but whether it had the same meaning here, we were at a loss to know.
However, this dumb manner of conversing with them we did not like, neither was it to any purpose to us; and I was resolved, if possible, to know something more of them than we could get thus; so I ordered out our pinnace with six oars, and as many other men well armed, to row among them; and, if possible, to take some of them and bring them on board.
They went off, but the six-oar pinnace, though a very nimble boat, could not row so fast as they could swim; for, if pulling with all their might, they came near one of them, immediately, like dog and duck, they would dive, and come up again thirty or forty yards off; so that our men did not know which way to row after them; however, at last getting among the thickest of them, they got hold of two, and with some difficulty dragged them in; but think of our surprise, to find they were not men, but both young women. However, they were brought on board naked as they were.
When they came on board, I ordered they should have two pieces of linen wrapped round their waists to cover them, which they seemed well pleased with. We gave them also several strings of beads, and our men tied them about their necks, and about their arms like bracelets, and they were wonderfully delighted with their ornaments. Others of our men gave each of them a pair of scissors, with needles and some thread, and threading the needles, showed them how to sew with them; we also gave them food, and each of them a dram of arrack, and made signs to know of them where they lived; they pointed up to the river, but we could by no means understand them.
When we had dressed them up thus with necklaces, and bracelets, and linen, we brought them up upon the deck, and made them call to their country folk, and let them see how well they were used, and the girls beckoned them to come on board, but they would not venture.
However, as I thought the discovery we were to make, would be something the easier on account of the usage of these two young women; for they were not, as we guessed, above twenty or two-and-twenty years of age; we resolved that the boat should go on, as we intended, up the river; and that, as the two women pointed that way, we should carry them along with us.
Accordingly we sent two shallops, or large boats, which carried together sixty men, all well armed. We gave them store of beads and knives and scissors, and such baubles with them, with hatchets and nails, and hooks, looking-gla.s.ses, and the like; and we built up the sides and sterns of the boats, and covered them with boards, to keep off arrows and darts, if they should find occasion, so that they looked like London barges. In this posture, as soon as the tide or flood was made up, our men went away, carrying a drum and a trumpet in each boat; and each boat had also two patereroes, or small cannon, fixed on the gunnel near the bow.
Thus furnished, they went off about eleven o"clock in the forenoon, and to my very great uneasiness, I heard no more of them for four days. The whole ship"s company were indeed surprised at their stay, and the captain of the sloop would fain have had me let him have sailed up the river with the sloop, as far as the channel would serve; which really we found was deep enough. Indeed, as I was unwilling to run any more risks, I could not persuade myself, but that the force I had already sent was sufficient to fight five thousand naked creatures, such as the natives seemed to be, and therefore, I was very unwilling to send. However, I consented at last to have our long-boat and two smaller boats manned with fifty-four men more, very well armed, and covered from arrows and darts as the other had been, to go up the river, upon their solemn promise, and with express order, to return the next day, at farthest; ordering them to fire guns as they went up the river, to give notice to their fellows, if they could be heard, that they were coming; and that, in the mean time, if I fired three guns they should immediately return.
They went away with the tide of flood, a little before noon, and went up the river about five leagues, the tide running but slowly, and a strong fresh of land-water that checked the current coming down; so that when the tide was spent they came to an anchor. They found the river, contrary to their expectation, continued both deep enough, and was wider in breadth than where the ships were at anchor; and that it had another mouth or outlet into the sea some leagues farther east, so that the land to the east of us, where our men went on sh.o.r.e, was but an island, and had not many inhabitants, if any; the people they had seen there having possibly swam over the other arm or branch of the river, to observe our ships the nearer. As our men found they could go no farther for want of the tide, they resolved to come to an anchor; but, just as they were sounding, to see what ground they had, and what depth, a small breeze at north-east sprang up, by which they stemmed the current and reached up about two leagues farther, when they hove over their grappling in five fathom water, soft ground; so that all this way, and much farther, every one of our ships might have gone up the channel, being as broad as the Thames is about Vauxhall.
It must be observed, that all along this river they found the land, after they came past the place where the other branch of the river broke off, eastward, was full of inhabitants on both sides, who frequently came down to the water-side in haste to look at our boats; but always when our men called to them, as if they thought our men inquired after their fellows, they pointed up the river, which was as much as to say, they were gone farther that way.
However, our men not being able to go any farther against the tide, took no notice of that; but, after a little while some of them, in one of the smaller boats, rowed towards the sh.o.r.e, holding up a white flag to the people in token of friendship; but it was all one, and would have been all one for aught we knew, if they had held up a red flag, for they all ran away, men, women, and children; nor could our men by any persuasions, by gestures and signs of any kind, prevail on them to stay, or hardly so much as to look at them.
The night coming on, our men knew not well what course to take; they saw several of the Indians" dwellings and habitations, but they were all at a distance from the river, occasioned, as our men supposed, by the river"s overflowing the flat grounds near its banks, so as to render those lands not habitable.
Our men had a great inclination to have gone up to one of the towns they saw, but he that commanded would not permit it; but told them, if they could find a good landing-place, that they might all go on sh.o.r.e, except a few to keep the boats, if they chose to venture; upon which the smallest boat rowed up about a mile, and found a small river running into the greater, and here they all resolved to land; but first they fired two muskets, to give notice, if possible, to their comrades, that they were at hand; however, they heard nothing of them.
What impression the noise of the two muskets made among the Indians they could not tell, for they were all run away before.
They were no sooner on sh.o.r.e, but, considering they had not above two hours day, and that the Indian villages were at least two miles off, they called a council, and resolved not to march so far into a country they knew so little of, and be left to come back in the dark; so they went on board again, and waited till morning. However, they viewed the country, found it was a fertile soil, and a great herbage on the ground; there were few trees near the river; but farther up where the Indian dwellings were, the little hills seemed to be covered with woods, but of what kind they knew not.
In the morning, before break of day, some of our men fancied they heard a gun fired up the river; upon which the officer ordered two muskets to be fired again, as had been done the evening before; and in about a quarter of an hour they were answered by the like firing, by which our men knew that their comrades heard them; so, without pursuing their intended landing, the tide being then running upwards, they weighed, and set to their oars, having little or no wind, and that which they had blowing down the stream.
After they had gone about a league, they heard a confused noise at a great distance, which surprised them a little at first; but, as they perceived it drew nearer and nearer, they waited awhile, when they discovered first here and there some people, then more, and then about two or three hundred men and women together, running, and every one carrying something.
Where it was they were going to, or what it was they carried, our men could not tell till they came nearer, when they found that they were all loaded with provisions, cocoa-nuts, roots, cabbages, and a great variety of things which the men knew little of; and all these were carrying down to our ships, as we understood afterwards, in grat.i.tude for our kind usage of the two young women.
When these people saw our men and their three boats, they were at a full stop, and once or twice they were ready to lay down all their loads, and run for it; but ours made signs of peace, and held up a white flag to them.
Some of them, it seems, having, as we found, conversed with our men, had a little more courage than the rest, and came to the sh.o.r.e side, and looked at the boats. One of our men thought of a stratagem to make known our desire of peace with them. Taking a string of beads and some toys, he held them up at the end of the boat-hook staff, and showed them to the Indians, pointing to them with his hand, and then pointing with the other hand to what the Indians carried, and to his mouth, intimating that we wanted such things to eat, and would give him the beads for them.
One of the Indians presently understood him, and threw himself into the water, holding a bundle of plants, such as he had trussed up together, upon his head, and swimming with the other hand, came so near the boat, where our men held out the staff, as to reach the end of the staff, take off the string of beads and toys, and hang his bunch of trash, for it was not better, upon the hook, and then went back again, for he would come no nearer.
When he was gotten on sh.o.r.e again, all his comrades came about him to see what he had got; he hung the string of beads round his neck, and ran dancing about with the other things in his hand, as if he had been mad.
What our men got was a trifle of less worth than a good bunch of carrots in England, but yet it was useful, as it brought the people to converse with us; for after this they brought us roots and fruits innumerable, and began to be very well acquainted with us.