having halted on our first approach, and never advancing a step afterwards. It was doubtless fortunate for our people that the enemy acted with so little prudence, and exerted so little spirit, since had they concealed themselves till our men had landed, it is scarcely possible but all the boat's crew must have fallen into their hands, as the Spaniards were not much short of two hundred, and the whole number with Mr. Brett only amounted to sixteen. However, the discovery of so considerable a force collected in this bay of Petaplan obliged us constantly to keep a boat or two before it: for we were apprehensive that the cutter, which we had left to cruise off Acapulco, might on her return be surprized by the enemy, if she did not receive timely information of her danger. But now to proceed with the account of the harbour of Chequetan. After our unsuccessful attempt to engage the people of {245} the country to furnish us with the necessaries we wanted, we desisted from any more endeavours of the same nature, and were obliged to be contented with what we could procure for ourselves in the neighbourhood of the port. We caught fish here in tolerable quantities, especially when the smoothness of the water permitted us to hale the seyne. Amongst the rest, we got cavallies, breams, mullets, soles, fiddle-fish, sea-eggs, and lobsters: and we here, and in no other place, met with that extraordinary fish called the torpedo, or numbing-fish, which is in shape very like the fiddle-fish, and is not to be known from it but by a brown circular spot about the bigness of a crown piece near the centre of its back. Perhaps its figure will be better understood when I say it is a flat fish much resembling the thorn-back. This fish, the torpedo, is indeed of a most singular nature, productive of the strangest effects on the human body: for whoever handles it, or happens even to set his foot upon it, is presently seized with a numbness all over him, but which is more distinguishable in that limb which was in immediate contact with it. The same effect too will be in some degree produced by touching the fish with anything held in the hand, since I myself had a considerable degree of numbness conveyed to my right arm, through a walking cane, which I rested on the body of the fish for a short time only; and I make no doubt but I should have been much more sensibly affected had not the fish been near expiring when I made the experiment, as it is observable that this influence acts with most vigour upon the fish's being first taken out of the water, and entirely ceases as soon as it is dead, so that it may be then handled, or even eaten, without any inconvenience. I shall only add, that the numbness of my arm upon this occasion did not go off on a sudden, as the accounts of some naturalists gave me reason to expect, but diminished gradually, so that I had some sensation of it remaining till the next day.