But On The North Side Of This Island The Channel Is About A Cross-Bow Shot In Breadth And 15 Fathoms Deep, Running N.W. And S.E. And On Both Sides This Channel Is Very Shallow And Full Of Rocks, The Fair Way Being In The Middle.

This channel is about a gun-shot in length, after which the coasts on both sides recede and form

Within a large fine and secure harbour, about a league long and half a league broad, deep in the middle but full of shoals near the land, and it hath no fresh water. At this place it was agreed to send back all the ships to Massua, and to proceed with only sixteen small gallies or row boats.

Arrangements being accordingly formed, we set sail from Arekea on the 30th at noon, and came to an anchor in a port called Salaka four leagues beyond Arekea and 96 from Swakem, the coast trending N. and S. with a slight deviation to N.E. and S.W. The land next the sea has many risings or hillocks, behind which there are high mountains. It must be noted that all the land from Arekea onwards close behind the shore puts on this uneven appearance, whereas before that it was all plain, till in the inland it rises in both into high mountains. The 31st we sailed from Salaka, and an hour before sunset we made fast to the rocks of a shoal a league from the land and 17 leagues from Salaka, being 43 leagues from Swakem. From the port of Salaka the coast begins to wind very much; and from Raseldoaer or Ras al Dwaer, it runs very low to the N.N.E. ending in a sandy point where there are 13 little hillocks or knobs of stone, which the Moorish pilots said were graves. From this point of the Calmes[294] about two leagues, the coast runneth N.N.W. to a shoal which is 43 leagues from Swakem. This point is the most noted in all these seas, as whoever sails from Massua, Swakem, and other places for Jiddah, Al Cossir, and Toro, must necessarily make this point. The sea for the last seventeen leagues is of such a nature that no rules or experience can suffice for sailing it in safety, so that the skilful as well as the unskilful must pass it at all hazards, and save themselves as it were by chance, for it is so full of numerous and great shoals, so interspersed everywhere with rocks, and so many and continual banks, that it seems better fitted for being travelled on foot than sailed even in small boats. In the space between Salaka and Ras-al-Dwaer, but nearer to the latter, there are three islands forming a triangle, the largest of which is called Magarzawn, about two leagues long and very high ground, but has no water. This island bears N. and S. with Ras-al-Dwaer distant three leagues.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 267 of 423
Words from 139552 to 140055 of 221361