And now it is necessary that I should relate the important intelligence which we met with on board her, partly from the information of the prisoners, and partly from the letters and papers which fell into our hands. We here first learned with certainty the force and destination of that squadron which cruised off Madeira at our arrival there, and afterwards chased the Pearl in our passage to Port St. Julian. And we had, at the same time, the satisfaction to find that Pizarro, after his utmost endeavours to gain his passage into these seas, had been forced back again into the River of Plate, with the loss of two of his largest ships; and besides this disappointment of Pizarro, which considering our great debility, was no unacceptable intelligence, we further learned that an embargo had been laid upon all shipping in these seas by the Viceroy of Peru, in the month of May preceding, on a supposition that about that time we might arrive upon the coast. But on the account sent overland by Pizarro of his own distresses, part of which they knew we must have encountered, as we were at sea during the same time, and on their having no news of us in eight months after we were known to set sail from St. Catherine's, they were fully persuaded that we were either shipwrecked, or had perished at sea, or at least had been obliged to put back again; for it was conceived impossible for any ships to continue at sea during so long an interval, and, therefore, on the application of the merchants and the firm persuasion of our having miscarried, the embargo had been lately taken off. A NARROW ESCAPE.