On
Leaving This Place Our Anchor Had Got Foul In Some Rock Or Sunken
Log In Very Deep Water, And After Many Unsuccessful Attempts, We
Were Forced To Cut Our Rattan Cable And Leave It Behind Us.
We
had now only one anchor left.
Starting early, on the 4th of October, the same S.S.W wind
continued, and we began to fear that we should hardly clear the
southern point of Gilolo. The night of the 5th was squally, with
thunder, but after midnight it got tolerably fair, and we were
going along with a light wind arid looking out for the coast of
Gilolo, which we thought we must be nearing, when we heard a dull
roaring sound, like a heavy surf, behind us. In a short time the
roar increased, and we saw a white line of foam coming on, which
rapidly passed us without doing any harm, as our boat rose easily
over the wave. At short intervals, ten or a dozen others overtook
us with bleat rapidity, and then the sea became perfectly smooth,
as it was before. I concluded at once that these must be
earthquake waves; and on reference to the old voyagers we find
that these seas have been long subject to similar phenomena.
Dampier encountered them near Mysol and New Guinea, and describes
them as follows: "We found here very strange tides, that ran in
streams, making a great sea, and roaring so loud that we could
hear them before they came within a mile of us. The sea round
about them seemed all broken, and tossed the ship so that she
would not answer her helm. These ripplings commonly lasted ten or
twelve minutes, and then the sea became as still and smooth as a
millpond. We sounded often when in the midst of them, but found
no ground, neither could we perceive that they drove us any way.
We had in one night several of these tides, that came mostly from
the west, and the wind being from that quarter we commonly heard
them a long time before they came, and sometimes lowered our
topsails, thinking it was a gust of wind. They were of great
length, from north to south, but their breadth not exceeding 200
yards, and they drove a great pace. For though we had little wind
to move us, yet these world soon pass away, and leave the water
very smooth, and just before we encountered them we met a great
swell, but it did not break." Some time afterwards, I learnt that
an earthquake had been felt on the coast of Gilolo the very day
we had encountered these curious waves.
When daylight came, we saw the land of Gilolo a few miles off,
but the point was unfortunately a little to windward of us. We
tried to brace up all we could to round it, but as we approached
the shore we got into a strong current setting northward, which
carried us so rapidly with it that we found it necessary to stand
off again, in order to get out of its influence.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 172 of 213
Words from 89530 to 90049
of 111511