On the 25th, I went a good way up the harbour in the boat, and having landed on the north side, we soon after found an old oar of a very singular make, and the barrel of a musquet, with the King’s broad arrow upon it. The musquet barrel had suffered so much from the weather, that it might be crumbled into dust between the fingers: I imagined it had been left there by the Wager’s people, or perhaps by Sir John Narborough. Hitherto we had found no kind of vegetables except a species of wild peas; but though we had seen no inhabitants, we saw places where they had made their fires, which however did not appear to be recent. While we were on shore we shot some wild ducks, and a hare; the hare ran two miles after he was wounded, though it appeared when he was taken up that a ball had passed quite through his body. I went this day many miles up the country, and had a long chace after one of the guanicoes, which was the largest we had seen: he frequently stopped to look at us, when he had left us at a good distance behind, and made a noise that resembled the neighing of a horse; but when we came pretty near him he set out again, and at

Voyaging Accounts