Their Children, When Young, Are Of A Comely Form, But Their
Noses Are Like Those Of The Negroes.
When they marry, the woman cuts off
one joint of her finger; and, if her husband die and she remarry again,
she cuts off another joint, and so on however often she may marry.
"They are a most filthy race, and will feed upon any thing, however
foul. When the Hollanders kill a beast, these people get the guts, and
having squeezed out the excrements, without washing or scraping, they
lay them upon the coals, and eat them before they are well heated
through. If even a slave of the Hollanders wish to have one of their
women, he has only to give her husband a piece of tobacco. Yet will they
beat their wives if unfaithful with one of their own nation, though they
care not how they act with the men of other nations. They are worshipers
of the moon, and thousands of them may be seen dancing and singing by
the sea-side, when they expect to see that luminary; but if it happen
to be dark weather, so that the moon does not appear, they say their god
is angry with them. While we were at the Cape, one of the Hodmandods
drank himself dead in the fort, on which the others came and put oil and
milk into his mouth, but finding he was dead, they began to prepare for
his burial in the following manner: - Having shaved or scraped his body,
arms, and legs, with their knives, they dug a great hole, in which they
placed him on his breech in a sitting posture, heaping stones about him
to keep him upright. Then came the women, making a most horrible noise
round the hole which was afterwards filled up with earth."
On the 15th June. 1686, Cowley sailed from the Cape, the homeward-bound
Dutch fleet consisting of three ships, when at the same time other three
sailed for Bolivia. On the 22d of June they passed the line, when Cowley
computed that he had sailed quite round the globe, having formerly
crossed the line nearly at the same place, when outward-bound from
Virginia in 1683. On the 4th August they judged themselves to be within
thirty leagues of the dangerous shoal called the Abrolhos, laid down
in lat. 15 deg. N. in the map: but Cowley was very doubtful if any such
shoal exist, having never met with any one who had fallen in with it,
and he was assured by a pilot, who had made sixteen voyages to Brazil,
that there was no such sand. The 19th September, Cowley saw land which
he believed to be Shetland. They were off the Maes on the 28th
September, and on the 30th Cowley landed at Helvoetsluys. He travelled
by land to Rotterdam, whence he sailed in the Ann for England, and
arrived safe in London on the 12th October, 1686, after a tedious and
troublesome voyage of three years and nearly two months.
SECTION III.
Sequel of the Voyage, so far as Dampier is concerned, after the
Separation of the Nicholas from the Revenge.[160]
This is usually denominated Captain William Dampier's first Voyage
round the World, and is given at large by Harris, but on the present
occasion has been limited, in this section, to the narrative of Dampier
after the separation of Captain Cowley in the Nicholas; the observations
of Dampier in the earlier part of the voyage, having been already
interwoven in the first section of this chapter.
[Footnote 160: Dampier's Voyages, Lond. 1729, vol. I. and II. Harris,
II. 84.]
This voyage is peculiarly valuable, by its minute and apparently
accurate account of the harbours and anchorages on the western coast of
South America, and has, therefore, been given here at considerable
length, as it may become of singular utility to our trade, in case the
navigation to the South Sea may be thrown open, which is at present
within the exclusive privileges of the East India Company, yet entirely
unused by that chartered body. - E.
* * * * *
Captain Eaton in the Nicholas having separated from the Revenge, left
the Gulf of Amapalla on the 2d September, 1684, as formerly mentioned,
which place we also left next day, directing our course for the coast of
Peru. Tornadoes, with thunder, lightning, and rain, are very frequent on
these coasts from June to November, mostly from the S.E. of which we had
our share. The wind afterwards veered to W. and so continued till we
came in sight of Cape St Francisco, where we met with fair weather and
the wind at S.
Cape St Francisco, in lat. 0 deg. 50' N. is a high full point of land,
covered with lofty trees. In passing from the N. a low point may be
easily mistaken for the cape, but soon after passing this point the cape
is seen with three distinct points. The land in its neighbourhood is
high, and the mountains appear black. The 20th September we came to
anchor in sixteen fathoms near the island of Plata, in lat. 1 deg. 15' S.
This island is about four miles long and a mile and half broad, being of
some considerable height, and environed with rocky cliffs, except in one
place at the east end, where the only fresh-water torrent of the isle
falls down from the rocks into the sea. The top of the island is nearly
flat, with a sandy soil, which produces three or four kinds of low small
trees, not known in Europe, and these trees are much overgrown with
moss. Among these trees the surface is covered with pretty good grass,
especially in the beginning of the year, but there are no land animals
to feed upon it, the great number of goats that used to be found here
formerly being all destroyed. Is has, however, a great number of the
birds named Boobies and Man-of-war birds.
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