At length we reached Montrose Island.  This is by much the best and pleasantest spot we had seen in this part of the world, though it has nothing on it eatable but some berries, which resemble goose-berries in flavour:  they are of a black hue, and grow in swampy ground; and the bush or tree that bears them, is much taller than that of our goose berries.  We remained here some time, living upon these berries and the remainder of our seal, which was now grown quite rotten.  Our two or three first attempts to put out from this island were without success, the tempestuous weather obliging us to put back again.  One of our people was much inclined to remain here, thinking it at least as good a place as Wager’s Island to end his days upon; but he was obliged by the rest to go off with them.  We had not been long out before it began to blow a storm of wind; and the mist came on so thick, that we could not see the land, and were at a loss which way to steer; but we heard the sea, which ran exceedingly high, breaking near us, upon which we immediately hauled aft the sheet, and hardly weathered the breakers by a boat’s length.  At the same time we shipped a sea that nearly filled us; it struck us with that violence as to throw me and one or two more down into the bottom of the boat, where we were half drowned before we could get up again.  This was one of the most extraordinary escapes we had in the course of this expedition; for Captain Cheap and every one else had entirely given themselves up for lost.  However, it pleased God that we got that evening into Red-wood Cove, where the weather continued so bad all night we could keep no fire in to dry ourselves with; but there being no other alternative for us but to stay here and starve, or put to sea again, we chose the latter, and put out in the morning again, though the weather was very little mended.

In three or four days after, we arrived at our old station, Wager’s Island, but in such a miserable plight, that though we thought our condition upon setting out would not admit of any additional circumstance of misery, yet it was to be envied in comparison of what we now suffered, so worn and reduced were we by fatigue and hunger, having eat nothing for some days but sea-weed and tangle.  Upon this expedition, we had been out, by our account, just two months; in which we had rounded, backwards and forwards, the great bay formed to the northward by that high land we had observed from Mount Misery.

The first thing we did upon our arrival was to secure the barge, as this was our sole dependence for any relief that might offer by sea; which done, we repaired to our huts, which formed a kind of village or street, consisting of several irregular habitations, some of which being covered by a kind of brush-wood thatch, afforded tolerable shelter against the inclemency of the weather.  Among these, there was one which we observed with some surprise to be nailed up.  We broke it open, and found some iron-work, picked out with much pains from those pieces of the wreck which, were driven ashore.  We concluded from hence, that the Indians who had been here in our absence were not of that tribe with which we had some commerce before, who seemed to set no value upon iron, but from some other quarter; and must have had communication with the Spaniards, from whom they had learned the value and use of that commodity.