I Left A Note Here Of My Arrival And The
State Of My Company, As Others Had Done Before Me.
All the time we
remained at the Cape, from the 23d December, 1609, to the 10th January,
1610, the wind was westerly and southerly; whereas the two former times
of my being here, at the same season, it blew storms at east.
[Footnote 184: This cape is only in lat. 34 deg. 4S' S. So that their
latitude here could not exceed 35 deg. 10', giving an error in excess of
eighteen minutes in the text - E.]
The 10th January, 1610, we weighed and set sail homewards. The 20th
about noon we passed the tropic of Capricorn; and that evening the Dutch
officers came and supped with me, whom I saluted with three guns at
parting. The 30th before day-light, we got sight of St Helena, having
steered sixty-six leagues west in that latitude. We came to anchor a
mile from shore, in twenty-two fathoms sandy ground, N.W. from the
chapel. This island is about 270 or 280 leagues west from the coast of
Africa. We were forced to steer close under the high land to find
anchorage, the bank being so steep as to have no anchorage farther out.
We weighed on the 9th February, making sail homewards, having received
from the island nineteen goats, nine hogs, and thirteen pigs. The 16th
we saw the island of Ascension, seven or eight leagues to the W.S.W. In
the morning of the 28th, the wind westerly and reasonably fair weather,
we spoke the Dutch ship, which made a waft for us at his mizen-top-mast
head. He told us that he had only eight or nine men able for duty, all
the rest being sick, and forty-six of his crew dead. This was a grievous
chastisement for them, who had formerly offered to spare me twenty men
or more upon occasion, and a never-sufficiently-to-be-acknowledged mercy
to us, that they should be in so pitiable a case, while we had not lost
one man, and were even all in good health. Towards night, considering
our leak, with many other just causes on our part, besides our want of
means to aid them, and at my company's earnest desire, we made sail and
left them, not without sensible Christian grief that we could give them
no assistance. Indeed, without asking us to remain by them, they desired
us to acquaint any Dutch ship we might meet of their extreme distress,
that the best means might be pursued for their relief. We were then in
lat. 45 deg. 6' N.
The 1st May, having fine weather and the wind at S.W. we were in lat.
49 deg. 13' N. Early in the morning of the 2d, the wind came S. and blew a
storm, putting us under our fore course. Towards night we spoke a
Lubecker, who told us Scilly bore E. by N. thirty-eight German miles
from us, which are fifty leagues.
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