A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16Kerr, Robert
History
A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16
Kerr, Robert
Voyages and travels
the stronger party, and plundered of every thing, without attempting
to make the least resistance.
We resumed our work in the afternoon, and the next day rigged the
fore-mast; the head of which being rather too small for the cap, the
carpenter went to work, to fix a piece on one side, to fill up the
vacant space. In cutting into the mast-head for this purpose, and
examining the state of it, both cheeks were found to be so rotten,
that there was no possibility of repairing them, and it became
necessary to get the mast out, and to fix new ones upon it. It was
evident, that one of the cheeks had been defective at the first, and
that the unsound part had been cut out, and a piece put in, which had
not only weakened the mast-head, but had, in a great measure, been
the occasion of rotting every other part of both cheeks. Thus, when we
were almost ready to put to sea, we had all our work to do over again;
and, what was still more provoking, an additional repair was to be
undertaken, which would require some time to be completed. But, as
there was no remedy, we immediately set about it. It was fortunate
for the voyage, that these defects were discovered, when we were in a
place, where the materials requisite were to be procured. For, amongst
the drift-wood, in the cove where the ships lay, were some small
seasoned trees very fit for our purpose. One of these was pitched
upon, and the carpenters began, without loss of time, to make out of
it two new cheeks.
In the morning of the 7th, we got the fore-mast out, and hauled it
ashore, and the carpenters of the ships were set to work upon it. Some
parts of the lower standing rigging having been found to be very much
decayed, as we had time now to put them in order, while the carpenters
were repairing the fore-mast, I ordered a new set of main-rigging to
be fitted, and a more perfect set of fore-rigging to be selected out
of the best parts of the old.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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