The time of the year being now too far spent for our purpose, we resolved to sail for Pulo Condore, a knot of small islands on the coast of Cambodia, and to return in May to lie in wait for the Acapulco ship.  We accordingly made sail from the island of Luconia on the 26th of February; and coming into the lat. of 14 deg.  N. we steered our course W. for Pulo Condore,[197] and in our way got sight of the south end of the Pracel shoals, being three small isles, or large spots of sand, just above water, only a mile from us.  We came in sight of Pulo Condore on the 13th March, and anchored next day on the north side of that island, in ten fathoms, on clean hard sand, two miles from the shore.

[Footnote 197:  This course ought rather to have been called W.S.W. as Pulo Condore is lat. 8 deg. 40’ N.]

Pulo Condore is the chief of a group of isles, and the only one of them that is inhabited, in lat. 8 deg. 44’ N. long. 106 deg. 5’ E. forty leagues S. by E. from the mouth of the river of Cambodia, otherwise called the Japanese river.  Two of these isles are tolerably high and large, and the rest very small.  The principal isle, off which we anchored, is five leagues long from E. to W. and three leagues broad, but in some places not a mile.  The other large isle is three miles long from N. to S. and between these, at the west end of the largest, there is a convenient harbour, the entrance being on the north, where the two isles are a mile asunder.  On the largest isle there grows a tall tree, three or four feet diameter, which the inhabitants cut horizontally half through, a foot from the ground, after which they cut out the upper part in a slope, till it meets the transverse cut, whence a liquor distils into a hollow made in the semicircular shelf, or stump, which, after being boiled, becomes good tar, and if boiled still more, becomes perfect pitch, both of these answering well for marine use.  Such a tree produces two quarts of this juice daily for a month, after which it dries up, but recovers again.

There are mango trees in this island, the fruit of which the inhabitants pickle with salt, vinegar, and a little garlic, while green.  On straight trees of a foot diameter, grapes, both red and white, and of a pleasant taste, much like those of Europe, grow in clusters about the body of the tree, like the cocoas.  This isle also abounds in wild nutmeg-trees, which resemble our walnut-trees, and the fruit grows among the boughs, in the same manner as walnuts.  This fruit resembles the true nutmeg, but smaller, and has neither smell nor taste.  Besides hogs, guanas, and lizards, these islands have various birds, as parrots, parakeets, turtle-doves, and wild poultry.  The sea affords limpits, muscles, and tortoises.  These isles have many brooks of fresh water running into the sea for ten months of the year; and they are very conveniently situated for trade with Japan, China, Manilla, Tonquin, Cochin-china, and other places.