hard, we rolled up the foot of our sail on a pole fastened to it, and settled our yard within three feet of the canoe sides, so that we had now but a small sail; yet it was still too big, considering the wind, for the wind being on our broadside, pressed her down very much, though supported by her outlagers, insomuch that the poles of the outlagers going from the sides of their vessel bent as if they would break; and should they have broken, our overturning and perishing had been inevitable. Besides, the sea increasing would soon have filled the vessel this way. Yet thus we made a shift to bear up with the side of the vessel against the wind for a while; but the wind still increasing, about 1 o'clock in the afternoon we put away right before wind and sea, continuing to run thus all the afternoon and part of the night ensuing. The wind continued increasing all the afternoon, and the sea still swelled higher and often broke, but did us no damage; for the ends of the vessel being very narrow, he that steered received and broke the sea on his back, and so kept it from coming in so much as to endanger the vessel; though much water would come in, which we were forced to keep heaving out continually. And by this time we saw it was well that we had altered our course, every wave would else have filled and sunk us, taking the side of the vessel; and though our outlagers were well lashed down to the canoe's bottom with rattans, yet they must probably have yielded to such a sea as this, when even before they were plunged under water and bent like twigs. The evening of this 18th was very dismal. The sky looked very black, being covered with dark clouds; the wind blew hard and the seas ran high. The sea was already roaring in a white foam about us, a dark night coming on, no land in sight to shelter us, and our little ark in danger to be swallowed by every wave; and what was worst of all, none of us thought ourselves prepared for another world. The reader may better guess than I can express the confusion that we were all in. I had been in many imminent dangers before now, some of which I have already related; but the worst of them all was but a playgame in comparison with this. I must confess that I was in great conflicts of mind at this time. Other dangers came not upon me with such a leisurely and dreadful solemnity: a sudden skirmish or engagement or so was nothing when one's blood was up and pushed forward with eager expectations. But here I had a lingering view of approaching death, and little or no hopes of escaping it; and I must confess that my courage, which I had hitherto kept up, failed me here; and I made very sad reflections on my former life, and looked back with horror and detestation on actions which before I disliked, but now I trembled at the remembrance of. I had long before this repented me of that roving course of life, but never with such concern as now. I did also call to mind the many miraculous acts of God's providence towards me in the whole course of my life, of which kind I believe few men have met with the like. For all these I returned thanks in a peculiar manner, and this once more desired God's assistance, and composed my mind as well as I could in the hopes of it; and, as the event showed, I was not disappointed of my hopes. Submitting ourselves therefore to God's good providence, and taking all the care we could to preserve our lives, Mr Hall and I took turns to steer, and the rest took turns to heave out the water, and thus we provided to spend the most doleful night I ever was in. About 10 o'clock it began to thunder, lighten, and rain; but the rain was very welcome to us, having drunk up all the water we brought from the island. wind at first blew harder than before; but within half-an-hour it abated, and became more moderate, and the sea also assuaged of its fury; and then by a lighted match, of which we kept a piece burning on purpose, we looked on our compass to see how The 1688.1 HARDSHIPS OF THE VOYAGE. we steered, and found our course to be still east. We had no occasion to look on the compass before, for we steered right before the wind, which if it had shifted, we had been obliged to have altered our course accordingly. But now it being abated, we found our vessel lively enough, with that small sail which was then aboard, to haul to our former course, SSE., which accordingly we did, being now in hopes again to get to the Island Sumatra. But about 2 o'clock in the morning of the 19th, we had another gust of wind, with much thunder, lightning, and rain, which lasted till day, and obliged us to put before the wind again, steering thus for several hours. It was very dark, and the hard rain soaked us so thoroughly, that we had not one dry thread about us. The rain chilled us extremely; for any fresh water is much colder than that of the sea. For even in the coldest climates the sea is warm, and in the hottest climates the rain is cold and unwholesome for man's body. In this wet starveling plight we spent the tedious night. Never did poor mariners on a lee-shore more earnestly long for the dawning light, than we did now. At length the day appeared; but with such dark black clouds near the horizon, that the first glimpse of the dawn appeared thirty or forty degrees high, which was dreadful enough. For it is a common saying among seamen, and true, as I have experienced, that a high dawn will have high winds, and a low dawn, small winds. We continued our course still east, before wind and sea, till about 8 o'clock in the morning of this 19th, and then one of our Malay friends cried out, "Pulo Way." Mr Hall, and Ambrose, and I, thought the fellow had said "Pull away," an expression usual among English seamen when they are rowing; and we wondered what he meant by it, till we saw him point to his consorts, and then we looking that way, saw land appearing like an island, and all our Malays said it was an island at the NW. end of Sumatra, called Way, 295 for Pulo Way is the Island Way. We, who were dripping with wet, cold and hungry, were all overjoyed at the sight of the land, and presently marked its bearing. It bore south, and the wind was still at west, a strong gale; but the sea did not run so high as in the night. Therefore we trimmed our small sail no bigger than an apron, and steered with it. Now our outlagers did us a great kindness again; for although we had but a small sail, yet the wind was strong, and pressed down our vessel's side very much; but being supported by the outlagers, we could brook it well enough, which otherwise we could not have done. About noon we saw more land, beneath the supposed Pulo Way; and steering towards it, before night we saw all the coast of Sumatra, and found the errors of our Achinese; for the high land that we first saw, which then appeared like an island, was not Pulo Way, but a great high mountain on the Island Sumatra, called by the English the Golden Mountain. Our wind continued till about 7 o'clock at night, then it abated, and at 10 o'clock it died away. And then we stuck to our oars again, though all of us quite tired with our former fatigues and hardships. The next morning, being the 20th, we saw all the low land plain, and judged ourselves not above eight leagues off. About 8 o'clock in the morning we had the wind again at west, a fresh gale; and steering in still for the shore, at 5 o'clock in the afternoon we ran to the mouth of a river on the Island Sumatra, called Passange Jonca. It is thirty-four leagues to the eastward of Achin, and six leagues to the west of Diamond Point. Our Malays were very well acquainted here, and carried us to a small fishing village, within a mile of the river's mouth, called also by the name of the River Passange Jonca. The hardships of this voyage, with the scorching heat of the sun at our first setting out, and the cold rain, and our continuing wet for the last two days, cast us all into fevers, so that now we were not able to help | kill us, for having brought them this each other, nor so much as to get our canoe up to the village; but our Malays got some of the townsmen to bring her up. voyage; yet I question whether they would attempted, or the country people have suffered it. We made a shift to dress our own food; for none of these people, though they were very kind in giving us anything that we wanted, would yet come near us to assist us in dressing our victuals; nay, they would not touch anything that we used. We had all fevers, and therefore took turns to dress victuals, according as we had strength to do it, or stomachs to eat it. I found my fever to increase, and my head so distempered, that I could scarce stand, therefore I whetted and sharpened my penknife, in order to let myself blood; but I could not, for my knife was too blunt. We stayed here ten or twelve days, in hopes to recover our health; but finding no amendment, we desired to go to Achin. But we were delayed by the natives, who had a desire to have kept Mr Hall and myself, to sail in their vessels to Malacca, Cudda, or other places whither they trade. But finding us more desirous to be with our countrymen in our factory at Achin, they provided a large proa to carry us thither, we not being able to manage our own canoe. The news of our arrival being noised abroad, one of the Oramkais, or noblemen of the island, came in the night to see us. We were then lying in a small hut at the end of the town, and it being late, this lord only viewed us, and having spoken with our Malays, went away again; but he returned to us the next day, and provided a large house for us to live in, till we should be recovered of our sickness; ordering the town's-people to let us want for nothing. The Achinese Malays that came with us, told them all the circumstances of our voyage; how they were taken by our ship, and where, and how we that came with them were prisoners aboard the ship, and had been set ashore together at Nicobar, as they were. It was for this reason, probably, that the gentlemen of Sumatra were thus extraordinary kind to us, to provide everything that we had need of; nay, they would force us to accept of presents from them, that we knew not what to do with, as young buffaloes, goats, &c., for these we would turn loose at night, after the gentle-sides, before this, three of our Malay men that gave them to us were gone, comrades were gone very sick into for we were prompted by our Achinese the country, and only one of them and consorts to accept of them for fear of the Portuguese remained with us, disobliging by our refusal. But the accompanying us to Achin, and they cocoa-nuts, plantains, fowls, eggs, both as sick as we. fish, and rice, we kept for our use. The Malays that accompanied us from Nicobar separated themselves from us now, living at one end of the house by themselves, for they were Mahometans, as all those of the kingdom of Achin are; and though during our passage by sea together we made them be contented to drink their water out of the same cocoashell with us, yet, being now longer under that necessity, they again took up their accustomed nicety and reservedness. They all lay sick, and as their sickness increased, one of them threatened us, that if any of them died, the rest should no Be It was the beginning of June 1688, when we left Passange Jonca. We had four men to row, one to steer, and a gentleman of the country that went purposely to give information to the Government of our arrival. We were but three days and nights in our passage, having sea-breezes by day and land winds by night, and very fair weather. When we arrived at Achin, I was carried before the Shabander, the chief magistrate in the city. One Mr Dennis Driscall, an Irishman, and a resident in the factory which our East India Company had there then, was interpreter. I, being weak, was suffered to stand 1688.] DAMPIER'S ILLNESS AT ACHEEN. in the Shabander's presence; for it is Three days after our arrival here, 297 abroad; and having been kindly in- But " Yet a So he gave over that design, and some English ships coming into Achin Road, he was not afraid of the After this Siamese who lay there. he again invited me to his house at Achin, and treated me always with | In short, it may suffice that I set out wine and good cheer, and still importuned me to go with him to Persia. But I being very weak, and fearing the westerly winds would create a great deal of trouble, did not give him a positive answer, especially because I thought I might get a better voyage in the English ships newly arrived, or some others now expected here.1 A short time after this, Captain Welden arrived here from Fort St George, in a ship called the Cartana, bound to Tonquin. This being a more agreeable voyage than to Persia, at this time of the year, besides that the ship was better accommodated, especially with a surgeon, and I being still sick, I therefore chose rather to serve Captain Welden than Captain Bowry. But to go on with a particular account of that expedition were to carry my reader back again; whom having brought thus far towards England in my circumnavigation of the Globe, I shall not now weary him with new rambles, nor so much swell this volume, as I must, to describe the tour I made in those remote parts of the East Indies from and to Sumatra. So that my voyage to Tonquin at this time, as also another to Malacca afterwards, with my observations in them, and the descriptions of those and the neighbouring countries; as well as the description of the Island Sumatra itself, and therein the kingdom and city of Achin, Bencouli, &c., I shall refer to another place, where I may give a particular relation of them.3 1 Captain Bowry was the writer of the letter from Borneo to the "English factory at Mindanao," referred to in Chapter XIII., page 249. 2 Bencoolen, where the English had settled in 1685, and where a year or two later the East India Company built a fort, which was called Fort York. to Tonquin with Captain Welden about July 1688, and returned to Achin in the April following. I stayed there till the latter end of September 1689, and making a short voyage to Malacca, came thither again about Christmas. Soon after that I went to Fort St George, and staying there about five months, I returned once more to Sumatra; not to Achin, but to Bencouli, an English factory on the west coast, of which I was gunner about five months more. So that, having brought my reader to Sumatra, without carrying him back, I shall bring him on next way from thence to England. And of all that occurred between my first setting out from this island in 1688, and my final departure from it at the beginning of the year 1691, I shall only take notice at present of two passages which I think I ought not to omit. 4 The first is, that at my return from Malacca, a little before Christmas 1689, I found at Achin one Mr Morgan, who was one of our ship's crew that left me ashore at Nicobar, now mate of a Danish ship of Trangambar, which is a town on the Coast of Coromandel, near Cape Comorin, belonging to the Danes: and receiving an account of our crew from him and others, I thought it might not be amiss to gratify the reader's curiosity therewith, who would probably be desirous to know the success of those ramblers in their new intended expedition towards the Red Sea. And withal I thought it might not be unlikely that these papers might fall into the hands of some of our London merchants, who were concerned in fitting out that ship; which, I said formerly, was called the Cygnet of London, sent on a trading voyage into the South Seas, under the command of Captain Swan. To proceed therefore with Morgan's relation. He told me, that when they in the Cygnet went away from Nicobar, in pursuit of their intended voyage to Persia, Tranquebar, then capital of the Danish possessions in India. |