the woods, we met with very few birds in our walks.  We never saw but three woodcocks, two of which were killed by Mr Hamilton, and one by myself.  These, with some humming-birds, and a large kind of robin red-breast, were the only feathered inhabitants of this island, excepting a small bird with two very long feathers in his tail, which was generally seen amongst the rocks, and was so tame, that I have had them rest upon my shoulder whilst I have been gathering shellfish.  Indeed, we were visited by many birds of prey, some very large, but these only occasionally, and, as we imagined, allured by some dead whale in the neighbourhood, which was once seen.  However, if we were so fortunate as to kill one of them, we thought ourselves very well off.  In one of my walks, seeing a bird of this latter kind upon an eminence, I endeavoured to come upon it unperceived with my gun, by means of the woods which lay at the back of that eminence; but when I had proceeded so far in the wood as to think I was in a line with it, I heard a growling close by me, which made me think it advisable to retire as soon as possible:  The woods were so gloomy I could see nothing; but as I retired, this noise followed me close till I had got out of them.  Some of our men did assure me that they had seen a very large beast in the woods, but their description of it was too imperfect to be relied upon.  The wood here is chiefly of the aromatic kind; the iron wood, a wood of a very deep red hue, and another, of an exceeding bright yellow.  All the low spots are very swampy; but, what we thought strange, upon the summits of the highest hills were found beds of shells, a foot or two thick.

The long-boat being nearly finished, some of our company were selected to go out in the barge in order to reconnoitre the coast to the southward, which might assist us in the navigation we were going upon.  This party consisted of Mr Bulkely, Mr Jones, the purser, myself, and ten men.  The first night we put into a good harbour, a few leagues to the southward of Wager’s Island, where finding a large bitch big with puppies, we regaled upon them.  In this expedition we had our usual bad weather and breaking seas, which were grown to such a height the third day, that we were obliged, through distress, to push in at the first inlet we saw at hand.  This we had no sooner entered, than we were presented with a view of a fine bay, in which having secured the barge, we went ashore; but the weather being very rainy, and finding nothing to subsist upon, we pitched a bell-tent, which we had brought with us, in the wood, opposite to where the barge lay.  As this tent was not large enough to contain us all, I proposed to four of the people to go to the end of the bay, about two miles distant from the bell-tent, to occupy the skeleton of an old Indian wigwam, which I had discovered in a walk that way upon our first landing.  This we covered to windward with sea-weed; and lighting a fire, laid ourselves