Notable Voyagers, From Columbus to NordenskioldKingston, William Henry Giles
History
Notable Voyagers, From Columbus to Nordenskiold
Kingston, William Henry Giles
Explorers; Voyages and travels
The dispersed ships, seeing the fires, shortly came to an anchor,
excepting the _Swan_ and the _Mary_, the Portugal prize, which had
parted company. This not being a convenient place, the squadron sailed
on the 15th of May, and on the 17th anchored in a sheltered bay, where
they remained fifteen days. Having made various necessary arrangements,
the Admiral sailed northwards to look out for the _Swan_, and dispatched
Captain Winter in the _Elizabeth_ for the same object. She was
fortunately soon discovered, and being brought back, was unladen and run
on shore, when she was broken up, her ironwork and planking being
distributed among the ships, the latter to be used as fuel and other
purposes.
While the crews were thus employed, the natives made their appearance on
the top of a hill, leaping, dancing, and holding up their hands, and
crying out in a curious fashion. With the exception of a skin of fur
cast about their shoulders, they were naked. Their bodies were painted,
and the chiefs wore feathers in their hair, which looked at a distance
like horns.
The Admiral on this sent a boat on shore with knives, bells, beads, and
other things, which he thought would please them. Seeing the strangers,
two of the natives came rushing down at a great rate, but stopped short
when still at some distance. On the English retiring, they, however,
advanced and took the articles which had been placed on sticks so that
they could be seen, leaving instead plumes of feathers, and bones shaped
like large toothpicks.
Their confidence was soon gained, and numbers coming down, mixed freely
among their visitors. They appeared to be a mild, well-disposed people,
and learned to place implicit confidence in the Admiral, who won the
affection of the chief by bestowing upon him the cap he usually wore.
The savage, as a curious mark of his affection, wounded himself with an
arrow in the leg, letting the blood stream on the ground.
These natives were well-made, good-looking, and remarkably active and
swift of foot. They obtained from the birds and seals frequenting the
shore an abundance of food, which, it appeared, they ate raw. They were
all armed with short bows, and arrows of reed headed with flints. The
English here killed large numbers of birds, which were so tame that they
perched on the men's heads and shoulders, and in a bay near at hand they
took upwards of two hundred seals in the space of an hour.
Having repaired and provisioned the ships, on the 3rd of June they set
sail, steering southward, but anchored again in two days in a bay, where
the caunter _Christopher_ was run on shore and her cargo removed.
Again they proceeded, after anchoring a short time, until they brought
up once more in another bay in 15 degrees 20 minutes, short only one
degree off the mouth of the straits.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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