The natives of the country about Saldanha bay are a very beastly people, especially in their feeding; for I have seen them eat the guts and garbage, dung and all.  They even eat the seals which we had cast into the river, after they had lain fourteen days, being then full of maggots, and stinking most intolerably.  We saw here several signs of wild beasts, some so fierce, that when we found their dens, we durst neither enter nor come near them.  The natives brought down to us ostrich eggs, some of the shells being empty, with a small hole at one end; also feathers of the same bird, and porcupine quills, which they bartered for our commodities, being especially desirous of iron, esteeming old pieces of that metal far beyond gold or silver.

Early on the 20th September,[275] we came out of the bay and set sail; and that night, being very dark and windy, we lost sight of the Union and our pinnace, called the Good Hope.  The Union put out her ensign about five o’clock p.m. for what reason we never knew, and lay too all that night.  We proceeded next day, and having various changes of wind, with frequent calms, we came on the 27th October to the latitude of 26 deg.  S. nearly in the parallel of St Lawrence.  Continuing our course with similar weather, we descried two or three small islands on the 22d November in the morning, and that afternoon came to another off a very high land, called Comoro.[276] Sending our boat ashore on the 24th, the people met five or six of the natives, from whom they bought plantains.  The 25th, by the aid of our boat towing the ship between two islands, as the wind would not serve, we came to anchor in the evening near the shore of Comoro, in between 17 and 20 fathoms water.

[Footnote 275:  Jones says the 25th, and that the subsequent storm, on the 26th, in which they lost sight of the Union and the pinnace, was so violent as to split their fore-course.—­E.]

[Footnote 276:  According to Jones, they wished to have passed to the south of Madagascar, making what is now called the outer and usual passage, but could not, and were forced to take the channel of Mozambique.—­E.]

The boat was sent ashore on the 26th with a present for the king, in charge of our factor, Mr Jordan, consisting of two knives, a sash or turban, a looking-glass and a comb, the whole about 15s. value.  The king received these things very scornfully, and gave them to one of his attendants, hardly deigning them a look:  Yet he told Mr Jordan, that if our general would come ashore, he might have any thing the country afforded, and he bowed to him very courteously on taking leave.  It appears the king had examined the present afterwards, and been better pleased with it, for he sent off a bullock to our general in the afternoon, when the messenger seemed highly gratified by receiving two penny knives.  Next day, the general went ashore with twelve attendants, carrying a small banquet as a present to the king, consisting of a box of marmalade,