Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 1.djvu/64

xlviii lieved the soldiers for a time, and many people of all ages and sexes were still dying every day.

harbour of Bengazi is full of fish, and my company caught a great quantity with a small net; we likewise procured a multitude with the line, enough to have maintained a larger number of persons than the family consisted of; we got vinegar, pepper, and some store of onions; we had little bread it is true, but still our industry kept us very far from starving. We endeavoured to instruct these wretches, gave them pack-thread, and some coarse hooks, by which they might have subsisted with the smallest attention and trouble; but they would rather starve in multitudes, striving to pick up single grains of corn, that were scattered upon the beach by the bursting of the sacks, or the inattention of the mariners, than take the pains to watch one hour at the flowing of the tide for excellent fish, where, after taking one, they were sure of being masters of multitudes till it was high water.

Captain of the small vessel lost no time. He had done his business well, and though he was returning for another cargo, yet he offered me what part of his funds I should need with great frankness. We now sailed with a fair wind, and in four or five days easy weather landed at Canea, a considerable fortified place at the west end of the island of Crete. Here I was taken dangerously ill, occasioned by the bathing and extraordinary exertions in the sea of Ptolometa, nor was I in the least the better from the beating I had received, signs of which I bore very long afterwards. 4 Rh