It was the 27th of September, that is, five days after our departure, before we had thus secured our anchor. However, we the same day got up our main-yard, so that having now conquered, in some degree, the distress and disorder which we were necessarily involved in at our first driving out to sea, and being enabled to make use of our canvass, we set our courses, and for the first time stood to the eastward in hopes of regaining the island of Tinian, and joining our commodore in a few days, since, by our accounts, we were only forty-seven leagues distant to the south-west. Hence, on the first day of October, having then run the distance necessary for making the island according to our reckoning, we were in full expectation of seeing it: but here we were unhappily disappointed, and were thereby convinced that a current had driven us considerably to the westward. This discovery threw us into a new perplexity; for as we could not judge how much we might hereby have deviated, and consequently how long we might still expect to be at sea, we had great apprehensions that our stock of water would prove deficient, since we were doubtful about the quantity we had on board, finding many of our casks so decayed as to be half leaked out. However, we were delivered from our uncertainty the next day, having then a sight of the island of Guam, and hence we computed that the currents had driven us forty-four leagues to the westward of our accounts. Being now satisfied of our situation by this sight of land, we kept plying to the eastward, though with excessive labour; for the wind continuing fixed in the eastern board, we were obliged to tack often, and our crew {306} was so weak that, without the assistance of every man on board, it was not in our power to put the ship about. This severe employment lasted till the 11th of October, being the nineteenth day from our departure, when arriving in the offing of Tinian, we were reinforced from the shore, as hath been already related; and on the evening of the same day we, to our inexpressible joy, came to an anchor in the road, thereby procuring to our shipmates on shore, as well as to ourselves, a cessation from the fatigues and apprehensions which this disastrous incident had given rise to. {307} CHAPTER V EMPLOYMENT AT TINIAN TILL THE FINAL DEPARTURE OF THE "CENTURION" FROM THENCE; WITH A DESCRIPTION OF THE LADRONES