On the 15th, after having been troubled several days with light breezes from the S. W. we had the wind N. E. and E. and stood southward to weather it. The land, this day, appeared very scabby to the naked eye, but, viewed through our glasses, we discovered these to be clear places, many of which were fenced about, and had houses upon them, the eaves of which reached to the ground. We saw also a great many palm-trees on the beach, as well as on the hills, some parts of which were cultivated. We had a bold shore, with hardly any beach. Toward evening the land near the shore appeared much flatter and more level; behind which, at a great distance, we discovered many high hills. Latitude 10° °.

On the 16th, in the morning, we had a brisk trade-wind from the east, and a view of the island of Rotté, which lies off the south end of Timor, and passed between it and Anamaboo, which lies to the S. W. of Timor. Both these islands were much lower than Timor; neither did they appear so fertile. We saw no houses, smoke, or cultivated land upon them, but many palms of a kind we were not acquainted with. We had a fine brisk trade-wind this day, but no soundings;
latitude, by observation, was 10°2°, about four or five leagues from the southermost part of Timor. In the night, between ten and eleven o'clock, before the moon was up, we saw a remarkable phaenomenon, which appeared in the south quarter, extending one point west, and two east, and was about twenty degrees high, like a glow of red rising from fire, striped with white, which shot up from the horizon in a perpendicular direction, alternately appearing and disappearing.

Voyaging Accounts