Page:Early voyages to Terra Australis.djvu/279

 VOYAGE TO THE SOUTH LAND. 123

Towards evening we determined to pass the night on shore, and pitched our camp in the wood, in a place where we found a fire which had heen lighted by the inhabitants, but whom, nevertheless, we did not see. We fed the fire by throwing on wood, and each quarter of an hour four of our people kept watch.

On the morning of the 6th, at sunrise, we divided our- selves into three companies, each taking a different route, to try if we could not, by this means, find some men. After three or four hours we rejoined each other near the river, without discovering anything beyond some huts and foot- steps. Upon which we betook ourselves to rest. Mean- while they brought me the nut of a certain fruit tree, resem- bling in form the drioens} having the taste of our large Dutch beans ; and those which were younger were like a walnut. I ate five or six of them, and drank of the water from the small pools ; but, after an interval of about three hours, I and five others who had eaten of these fruits began to vomit so violently that we were as dead men ; so that it was with the greatest difficulty that I and the crew regained the shore, and thence, in company with the skipper, were put on board the galliot, leaving the rest on shore.

On the Tth the whole of the crew returned on board with the boats, bringing with them two young black swans. The mouth of the said river lies in 31 degrees 46 minutes; and at eleven, nine, and seven gunshots from the mainland, are five and a half fathoms of water on good bottom. Between the river and Rottenest Island, which is at nearly five leagues distance. Captain De Vlaming had the misfortune to break his cable.

On the 9th, De Vlaming made sail for the mainland.

On the 10th we followed him with the galliot, and cast anchor off the mainland, in thirteen fathoms. A council was

^ This word, which is perhaps misspelt, does not occur in Nemnick's polyglot Lexicon der Naturgeschlchte.