The "Charles" now sailed to Coquimbo, and soon after the "Barclay" was recaptured. The "Walker," however, and her captor the "Nimrod," which Porter most desired to find, had by this time disappeared. Taking the "Barclay" along, the "Essex" made for the Galapagos,--a group of uninhabited islands much used by the whaling-ships as a refuge and rendezvous. Good anchorage was to be found here, and whales abounded in the neighborhood; but the principal product of the islands was the land-turtle. There were great numbers of these of large size, some of them as much as five feet across, and they would live for months in the ship's hold without food or water. They made delicious food, and the sailors found them an agreeable change from salt pork and hard-tack; so that every ship calling at the islands took great quantities of them on board. [Illustration: APPROACHING THE GALAPAGOS ISLANDS.] Some years before, an Irishman named Patrick Watkins had deserted from a whale-ship, and had settled on one of the islands at a place which came to be known as Pat's Landing. Here he had built himself a little cabin and planted a potato-patch, and he would sell potatoes and pumpkins to the whaling-crews for rum, to the use of which he was much addicted. He led a wretched life, becoming like a savage in appearance, his hair and beard matted, and his clothes in rags. He spent his time in wandering about the island, doing enough work to keep his garden-patch in order, but as soon as he had laid in a supply of liquor, keeping himself drunk until it was exhausted. He was a half-crazy creature, and once he frightened a negro boat-keeper into leaving the boat and going off with him as his slave. For this he was severely punished by the captain to whom the boat belonged, and ever after he sought to wreak vengeance upon the whalers. At last by some means or other he got a boat and sailed away to the mainland, where he was locked up by the authorities. All this happened shortly before the arrival of the "Essex," so that the islands were now deserted. But on one of them was found a rough sort of post-office, made of a box nailed to a tree, in which the whalers touching at the island left letters containing news of their movements. From these it was learned that six whalers had put in here some time before with two thousand and five hundred barrels of oil. One of the letters was from the master of the American ship "Sukey," and read as follows:--