Page:Early voyages to Terra Australis.djvu/319

 dampier's voyages. 163

all these sorts of cod fruit growing on the sandhills by the sea side, some of them green, some ripe, and some fallen on the ground ; but I could not perceive that any of them had been gathered by the natives, and might not probably be wholesome food.

The land farther in, that is lower than what borders on the sea, was, so much as we saw of it, very plain and even, partly savannahs, and partly woodland. The savannahs bear a sort of thin coarse grass. The mould is also a coarser sand than that by the sea side, and in some places 'tis clay. Here are a great many rocks in the large savannah we were in, which are five or six foot high, and round at the top like a haycock, very remarkable, some red and some white. The woodland lies farther in still, where there were divers sorts of small trees, scarce any three foot in circumference ; their bodies twelve or fourteen foot high, with a head of small knibs or boughs. By the sides of the creeks, especially nigh the sea, there grow a few small black mangrove trees.

There are but few land animals. I saw some lizards, and my men saw two or three beasts like hungry wolves, lean like so many skeletons, being nothing but skin and bones : 'tis probable that it was the foot of one of those beasts that I mention'd as seen by us in N, Holland (vol. i, p. 463). We saw a rackoon or two, and one small speckled snake.

The land fowls that we saw here were crows (just such as ours in England), small hawks, and kites, a few of each sort ; but here are plenty of small turtledoves, that are plump, fat, and very good meat. Here are two or three sorts of smaller birds, some as big as larks, some less ; but not many of either sort. The sea fowl are pelicans, boobies, noddies, curlews, sea-pies, etc., and but few of these neither.

The sea is plentifully stock'd with the largest whales that I ever saw, but not to compare with the vast ones of the northern seas. We saw also a great many green turtle, but caught none ; here being no place to set a turtle net in ;