happily escaped them, though they were many times very near:  One of them, which was upwards of twenty feet-long, came close to one of the boats that was watering, and having seized a large seal, instantly devoured it at one mouthful; and I myself saw another of nearly the same size do the same thing under the ship’s stern.  Our people killed and sent off several of the goats, which we thought as good as the best venison in England; and I observed, that one of them appeared to have been caught and marked, its right ear being slit in a manner that could not have happened by accident.[35] We had also fish in such plenty, that one boat would, with hooks and lines, catch, in a few hours, as much as would serve a large ship’s company two days:  They were of various sorts, all excellent in their kind, and many of them weighed from twenty to thirty pounds.

[Footnote 35:  The other account says the same of two of the goats caught here, and conjectures, as no traces of inhabitants were then to be discovered in the island, that “some solitary Selkirk had dwelt there, who, like his namesake at Juan Fernandez, when he caught more than he wanted, marked them and let them go.”  Captain Carteret gives some particulars respecting this island, to which the reader is referred.—­E.]

This evening, the surf running very high, the gunner and one of the seamen who were on shore with the waterers, were afraid to venture off, and the boat therefore, when she came on board the last time, left them behind her.

The next day we found a more convenient watering-place about a mile and a half to the northward of the ship, and about the middle-way between the north and south points of the island, there being at this place less surf than where the boats first went on shore.  The tide here set twelve hours to the northward, and twelve to the southward, which we found very convenient, for as the wind was southerly, with a great swell, the boats could not otherwise have got on board with their water.  We got off ten tons of water from the new watering-place this day, and in the afternoon I sent a boat to fetch off the gunner and seaman, who had been left on shore at the old watering-place the night before; but the surf was still so great, that the seaman, who could not swim, was afraid to venture:  He was therefore again, left behind, and the gunner stayed with him.

As soon as this was reported to me, I sent another boat to inform them, that as, by the appearances of the weather, there was reason to believe it would soon blow hard, I was afraid I might be driven off the bank in the night, the consequence of which would be that they must be left behind upon the island.  When the boat came to the surf, the people on board delivered my message, upon which the gunner swam through the surf, and got on board her; but the seaman, though he had a cork-jacket on, said he was sure he should be drowned if he attempted to get off to the boat, and that, chusing rather to die a natural death, he