They Are Destitute Of Wood,
Their Fire Is Turf And Cow Shardes.
They have corn, bigge, and
oats, with which they pay their king's rent to the maintenance of
his house.
They take great quantity of fish, which they dry in the
wind and sun; they dress their meat very filthily, and eat it
without salt. Their apparel is after the nudest sort of Scotland.
Their money is all base. Their Church and religion is reformed
according to the Scots. The fishermen of England can better declare
the dispositions of those people than I, wherefore I remit other
their usages to their reports, as yearly repairers thither in their
courses to and from Iceland for fish.
We departed here hence the 8th of June, and followed our course
between west and north-west until the 4th of July, all which time we
had no night, but that easily, and without any impediment, we had,
when we were so disposed, the fruition of our books, and other
pleasures to pass away the time, a thing of no small moment to such
as wander in unknown seas and long navigations, especially when both
the winds and raging surges do pass their common and wonted course.
This benefit endureth in those parts not six weeks, whilst the sun
is near the tropic of Cancer, but where the pole is raised to 70 or
80 degrees it continueth the longer.
All along these seas, after we were six days sailing from Orkney, we
met, floating in the sea, great fir trees, which, as we judged,
were, with the fury of great floods, rooted up, and so driven into
the sea.
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