A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 12: Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the; Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea; and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present TimeKerr, Robert
History
A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 12: Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the; Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea; and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present Time
Kerr, Robert
Voyages and travels
We continued here eight days, during which time we completed our wood
and water, dried our sails, and sent great part of the ship's company on
shore, to wash their clothes and stretch their legs, which was the more
necessary, as the cold, snowy, and tempestuous weather had confined them
too much below. We caught mussels and limpets, and gathered celery and
nettles in great abundance. The mussels were the largest we had ever
seen, many of them being from five to six inches long: We caught also
great plenty of fine, firm, red fish, not unlike a gurnet, most of which
were from four to five pounds weight. At the same time we made it part
of the employment of every day to try the current, which we found
constantly setting to the eastward.
The master having been sent out to look for anchoring-places, returned
with an account that he could find no shelter, except near the shore,
where it should not be sought but in cases of the most pressing
necessity. He landed upon a large island on the north side of Snow
Sound, and being almost perished with cold, the first thing he did was
to make a large fire, with some small trees which he found upon the
spot. He then climbed one of the rocky mountains, with Mr Pickersgill, a
midshipman, and one of the seamen, to take a view of the streight, and
the dismal regions that surround it. He found the entrance of the sound
to be full as broad as several parts of the streight, and to grow but
very little narrower, for several miles inland on the Terra del Fuego
side. The country on the south of it was still more dreary and horrid
than any he had yet seen: It consisted of craggy mountains, much higher
than the clouds, that were altogether naked from the base to the summit,
there not being a single shrub, nor even a blade of grass to be seen
upon them; nor were the vallies between them less desolate, being
entirely covered with deep beds of snow, except here and there where it
had been washed away, or converted into ice, by the torrents which were
precipitated from the fissures and crags of the mountain above, where
the snow had been dissolved; and even these vallies, in the patches that
were free from snow, were as destitute of verdure as the rocks between
which they lay.
On Sunday the first of March, at half an hour after four o'clock in the
morning, we saw the Swallow under sail, on the north shore of Cape Quod.
At seven we weighed, and stood out of Butler's Bay, but it falling calm
soon afterwards, the boats were obliged to take the vessel in tow,
having with much difficulty kept clear of the rocks: The passage being
very narrow, we sent the boats, about noon, to seek for anchorage on the
north shore. At this time, Cape Notch bore W. by N. 1/2 N. distant
between three and four leagues, and Gape Quod E. 1/2 N. distant three
leagues.
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