* * * * *
"This Diligent Observer Hath Taken Like Pains Touching Saldanha Bay:
But
as we touch there often, and have already given many notices of that
place, we shall now double the Cape, and take a view along with him of
Cape St Augustine." - Purch.
* * * * *
Sec. 2. Observations made at St Augustine in Madagascar, and at the Island
of Socotora.
St Augustine, in the great island of St Lawrence or Madagascar, is
rather a bay than a cape or point, as it has no land much bearing out
beyond the rest of the coast. It is in 23 deg. 30' S. latitude, the
variation here being 15 deg. 40, and may be easily found, as it has
breaches[211] on either side some leagues off to the W.S.W. Right from
the bay to seaward the water is very deep; but within the bay the ground
is so very shelvy, that you may have one anchor to the north in 22
fathoms, and your other anchor in more than 60; while in some places
nearer shore you will not have two feet at low water, and deep water
still farther in; the whole ground a soft ooze. Within a mile or two of
the bay the land is high, barren, and full of rocks and stones, with
many small woods. Two rivers run into the bottom of the bay, the land
about them being low, sandy, and overflowed; and these rivers pour in so
much water into the bay that their currents are never stemmed by the
tide, which yet rises two fathoms, by which the water in the bay is very
thick and muddy.
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