Page:Colnett - Voyage to the South Pacific (IA cihm 33242).djvu/34

 ninth intant, had the weather not been o dark and clouded, we ought, by our obervations, to have een ome of them. At four in the afternoon we got ight of the Iland Ferro, ditant about five or ix leagues. From hence I was peruaded to get in the Longitude of 21° Wet, in the Latitude of the Ile of Sal one of the Cape de Verds, and run down in that parallel for the Ile with an expectation of catching whale. This was not merely a curious inclination, but a ene of duty, which inpired the wih to begin my acquaintance with that buines, at as early a period of the voyage as poible. Dark, hazy and cloudy weather accompanied us all the way from the Canaries, and our rigging was covered with dut of the colour of brown and, as if it had been laying on hore. We ran the ditance by watch and reckoning to a few miles, but the continuance of hazy weather prevented our eeing it: and as it blew trong with a heavy ea, it was the whaling mater's opinion, with uch weather we could do nothing with fih, if we fell in with them: I accordingly bore up, and run down the lee-ide of Bonavita. Light winds prevented our croing the Equator until the tenth of February, at midnight, in Longitude 24° 30′ Wet of Greenwich, and all the fih we had as yet caught, were a hark and a porpoie.

In the Latitude of 19° South, and Longitude 55° Wet, we lot the South Eat trade wind, which had accompanied us