This storm drove us away to the northward; and I once thought we should have been driven back to the Cape again; which, if it had happened, I believe we should never have gone on with the voyage; for the men began to murmur again, and say we were bewitched; that we were beaten off first from the south of America, that we could never get round there, and now driven back from the south of Africa; so that, in short, it looked as if fate had determined this voyage to be pursued no farther. The wind continued, and blew exceeding hard: and, in short, we were driven so far to the north, that we made the south point of the island of Madagascar. My pilot knew it to be Madagascar as soon as he had a clear view of the land; and, having beaten so long against the sea to no purpose, and being in want of many things, we resolved to put in; and accordingly made for Port St. Augustine, on the west side of the island, where we came to an anchor in eleven fathom water, and a very good road. I could not be without a great many anxious thoughts upon our coming into this island; for I knew very well that there was a gang of desperate rogues here, especially on the northern coast, who had been famous for their piracies; and I did not know but that they might be either strong enough as pirates to take us, or rogues enough to entice a great many of my men to run away; so I resolved neither to come near enough the shore to be surprised, nor to suffer any of my men to go on shore, such excepted as I could be very secure of. But I was soon informed by a Dutchman, who came off to me with some of the natives in a kind of canvass boat, that there were no Europeans there but himself, and the pirates were on the north part of the island; that they had no ship with them of any force, and that they would be glad to be fetched off by any Christian ship; that they were not above two hundred in number, their chief leaders, with the only ships of force they had, being out a cruising on the coast of Arabia, and the Gulf of Persia. After this, I went on shore myself with Captain Merlotte, and some of the men whom I could trust; and we found it true as the Dutchman had related. The Dutchman gave us a long history of his adventures, and how he came to be left there by a ship he came in from Europe, which, he running up into the country for sport with three more of his comrades, went away without them, and left them among the natives, who, however, used them extremely well; and that now he served them for an interpreter and a broker, to bargain for them with the European ships for provisions. Accordingly, he engaged to bring us what provisions we pleased, and proposed such trinkets in return as he knew the natives desired, and as were of value little enough to us; but he desired a consideration for himself in money, which, though it was of no use to him there, he said it might be hereafter; and, as his demand was but twenty pieces of eight, we thought he very well deserved them.