Besides A
Large Loading Of Flour, The Three Captured Ships Had A Good Quantity Of
Fruits And Sweetmeats, Which Made
Them agreeable prizes to the English,
who were now very short of provisions; but they had landed no less than
800,000 dollars, on hearing that there were enemies in these seas.
It was now resolved to carry their prizes to some secure place, where
the best part of the provisions they had now procured might be laid up
in safety, for which purpose they steered for the Gallapagos or
Enchanted Islands,[151] which they got sight of on the 31st May, and
anchored at night on the east side of one of the easternmost of these
islands, a mile from shore, in sixteen fathoms, on clear white hard
sand. To this Cowley gave the name of King Charles's Island. He
likewise named more of them, as the Duke of Norfolk's Island immediately
under the line, Dessington's, Eares, Bindley's, Earl of Abington's, King
James's, Duke of Albemarles, and others. They afterwards anchored in a
very good bay being named York Bay. Here they found abundance of
excellent provisions, particularly guanoes and sea and land tortoises,
some of the latter weighing two hundred pounds, which is much beyond
their usual weight. There were also great numbers of birds, especially
turtle-doves, with plenty of wood and excellent water; but none of
either of these was in any of the other islands.[152]
[Footnote 151: These islands, so named by the Spaniards from being the
resort of tortoises, are on both sides of the line, from about the Lat.
of 2 deg.
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