[Deep Grief seizes the Captain.] My Father’s Ague lasted not long, but deep grief daily more and more increased upon him, which so over-whelmed even his very heart, that with many a bitter sigh he used to utter these words, These many years even from my youth have I used the Seas, in which time the Lord God hath delivered me from a multitude of Dangers; rehearsing to me what great Dangers he had been in, in the Straits by the Turks and by other Enemies, and also in many other places, too large here to insert, and always how merciful God was to him in delivering him out of them all, So that he never knew what it was to be in the hand of an Enemy; But now in his old Age, when his head was grown grey, to be a Captive to the Heathen, and to leave his Bones in the Eastern Parts of the World, when it was his hopes and intention, if God permitted him to finish this Voyage, to spend and end the residue of his days at home with his Children in his Native Countrey, and to settle me in the Ship in his stead; the thoughts of these things did even break his heart.

[Their Sickness continues.] Upwards of three Months my Father lay in this manner upon his Bed, having only under him a Mat and the Carpet he sat upon in the Boat when he came ashore, and a small Quilt I had to cover him withall.  And I had only a Mat upon the Ground and a Pillow to lay on, and nothing to cover me but the Cloths on my back:  but when I was cold, or that my Ague came upon me, I used to make a Fire, Wood costing nothing, but the fetching.

[Their Boy’s disobedience adds to their trouble.] We had a black Boy my Father brought from Porto Nova to attend upon him, who seeing his Master to be a Prisoner in the hands of the People of his own Complexion, would not now obey his Command, further than what agreed unto his own humour, neither was it then as we thought in our Power to compel or make him; but it was our ignorance.  As for me, my Ague now came to a settled course; that is, once in three days, and so continued for Sixteen Months time.

[His excessive sorrow.] There appearing now to us no probability, whereupon to build any hopes of Liberty, the sence of it struck my Father into such an Agony and strong Passion of Grief, that once I well remember in Nine days time nothing came into his mouth, but cold water; neither did he in three Months together ever rise up out of his Bed, but when the course of Nature required it:  always groaning and sighing in a most piteous manner:  which for me to hear and see come from my dear Father, my self also in the same Condition, did almost break my heart.  But then I felt that Doctrine most true, which I had read out of Mr. Roger’s Book, That God is most sweet, when the world is most bitter.

In this manner my Father lay until the Ninth of February 1660/61.  By which time he was consumed to an Anatomy, having nothing left but Skin to cover his Bones; yet he often would say, That the very sound of Liberty would so revive him, that it would put strength into his Limbs.  But it was not the will of him, to whom we say, Thy will be done, to have it so.