That island is covered in every part with thick forest and vast swamps and bogs, from which arise exhalations exceeding noisome as well to the native people as to our English. From camping oft on the borders of such oozy fens I took an Irish ague, suffering sharp pains in all my limbs, with shivering and vomiting, my teeth chattering, my head oppressed with ringing noises intolerable. So sore was I beset by this most malignant distemper as that all my strength departed from me; I could neither sit my horse nor march afoot, and was afflicted with so desperate a languor and exhaustion that I believed myself nigh unto death. Being in so dreadful a case, I must needs be left behind in a small fort, that had lately been constructed to command a ford on the border of O’Neill’s country; and I am sure that when my companions shook my hand and bade me farewell, none expected ever to see me in life again. But by the mercy of God and the devotion of my servant (there was no physician in that place) I recovered of my fever; and within ten days or so I felt myself ready to make a push towards the army that had gone before. We had learnt by scourers that our people were then distant some thirty miles across the hills, intending to advance further towards the north. By this it was plain that I must needs hasten if I would come up with them, and there was the more reason for this in that the hills were known to be the haunt and covert of rebels. But I had good hope that, being furnished with a noble horse, and accompanied with my stout and mettlesome servant, and three tall natives of the country, of proven loyalty, I might compass the journey of thirty miles in security. I acknowledge that, having been occupied of late in hunting a broken rabble, I held the enemy in lighter esteem than I ought; and when I look back upon the matter, I feel some scorn of my recklessness, and deem that in what befell me I had no more than my desert.