They are to be had ripe all the year round, but there is one season in which they are best and fittest for keeping, which was past before the Dutch arrived, and the oranges were then mostly over ripe and beginning to rot.  The island also produces lemons, and has plenty of oxen, cows, goats, and hogs, which the negroes bartered for salt.  On the S.E. part of the island there is a good watering-place, but difficult to find, which is commanded by a stone breast-work, whence the negroes might greatly annoy any who attempted to water by force.  They grow here some cotton, which is sent to Portugal.  The natives are treacherous, and require to be cautiously dealt with.

The fleet left Annobon on the 4th November, and on the 6th January, 1624, they were in lat. 44 deg. 40’ S. where they saw many sea-gulls, and much herbage floating on the water, whence they supposed themselves near the continent of South America.  On the 19th the sea appeared as red as blood, proceeding from an infinite quantity of a small species of shrimps.  On the 28th they lost sight of their bark, in which were eighteen men, three of them Portuguese.  These people, as they afterwards learnt, having in vain endeavoured to rejoin the fleet, determined to return to Holland.  Being in want of water, they sailed up the Rio de la Plata till they came into fresh water, after which they continued their voyage, suffering incredible hardships, and the utmost extremity of want, till they arrived on the coast of England, where they ran their vessel on shore to escape a privateer belonging to Dunkirk, and afterward got back to Holland.

The 1st February the fleet came in sight of land, being Cape de Pennas.[135] Next day they found themselves at the mouth of the straits.  This is easily distinguished, as the country on the east, called Saten Land, is mountainous, but broken and very uneven; while that on the west, called Maurice Land by the Dutch, or Terra del Fuego, has several small round hills close to the shore.  The 6th they had sight of Cape Horn; and on the 11th, being in lat. 58 deg. 30’ S. they had excessively cold weather, which the people were ill able to bear, being on short allowance.  On the 16th they were in lat. 56 deg. 10’ S. Cape Horn being then to the east of them, and anchored on the 17th in a large bay, which they named Nassau bay.[136] Another bay was discovered on the 18th, in which there was good anchorage, with great convenience for wooding and watering, and which they called Schapenham’s bay, after the name of their vice-admiral.

[Footnote 135:  This seems to be what is now called Cape St Vincent, at the W. side of the entrance into the Straits of Le Maire.—­E.]

[Footnote 136:  The centre of Nassau bay is in lat. 55 deg. 30’ N. long. 68 deg. 20’ W. This bay is formed between Terra del Fuego on the north, and Hermite’s island south by east, the south-eastern extreme point of which is Cape Horn.  This island appears to have been named after admiral Le Hermite.—­E.]