Most of our crew were new hands; and out of 30 men only six were found who could go aloft with any degree of usefulness in rough weather. Having spare spars, we were soon rigged again. Made the Azores. Took one whale from which we got 60 barrels of oil. We also replaced our spars; got potatoes, onions, oranges, &c., from them. We touched at Cape Verdes; got hogs, goats, &c.; then shaped our course for the Falkland islands, "so denominated by the English, in 1639, in honor, it is supposed of Lord Viscount Falkland. The soil is bad, and the climate is disagreeable, and the shores are beaten with perpetual storms. Nothing but reeds and moss cover the ground. The sky is perpetually concealed from view by thick fogs. The extreme cold cannot be alleviated by fire, as there is neither wood or coal; and even a ship in port is covered with constant snow. The shores are frequented, however, by considerable quantities of sea-fowl and fish. The penguins, called swans by the Spaniards, supply a scanty and miserable food. Walruses, and others of the seal kind, abound.
"The history of the disputes between Great Britain and Spain, concerning these miserable islands, furnishes another of the evidences of the necessity of the study of geography among statesmen, as nothing but a complete geographical ignorance concerning them, could have raised such an unnecessary alarm on both sides."
We left the Falklands to double the cape. A few days after, a heavy wind arose from the north. We shortened sail as the gale increased, until we come down to close reefed main-top-sail, scudding the ship for four days. The sea ran most fearfully high, throwing the water in at one side, and putting it out at the other. While the ship was thus laboring, we were ordered to lighten her top hamper, by sending down the fore and mizen top-gallant and main royal yards. While another and myself were in the act of lowering the main royal yard the ship rolled very quick and heavy. I missed my hold and falling, struck on the main-top-sail reef tackle, which was very tight and fast. I struck on my side, turned a complete somerset, fell again, and thrust my legs between the shrouds and ratline, and there hung. The mate hearing the rigging shake, cried out, "who is there?" I answered some way, scarce knowing how. He, knowing my voice, came running to help me to the deck, when I fainted and fell. He picked me up, and placed me on the after hatchway. At that moment a tremendous sea struck the vessel, carrying the mate and myself into the lee scupper. Assistance being at hand, we were taken out, and I carried to the cabin. It was sometime before I came to my senses. Found three of my ribs broken, and bruised much elsewhere. I was carried into the forecastle, where I remained suffering most extremely for a long time; and have hardly, I may say, recovered from the effects to the present day. The gale continued with unabated fury. The latitude being nearly run out, the ship was hove to with her head to the west. There we lay drifting four weeks. Fell in with mountains of ice, commonly known as icebergs, of vast dimensions, and of almost every form. An estimate was made of the size of one supposed to be the largest seen. It seemingly was an hundred and fifty or two hundred feet high; and, as is a fact, the volume of ice is to that of sea water as 10 to 9, consequently the ice, which rises above the water, is to that which sinks below as 1 to 9. Then allowing this mass to have been 150 feet above the water, and of regular shape, it would sink below the surface about 1350 feet, making a huge mass of some 1500 feet high. Capt. Cook, in his voyage in 1773, describes one as being 600 feet high above the water, making, as he estimated, 5,400 feet to be its entire height. "And yet," says Cook, "the sea broke over them." They exhibited for a few moments a view very pleasing to the eye; but a sense of danger soon filled the mind with horror; for had the ship struck against the weather side of one of those islands, when the sea ran high, she would instantly have been dashed in pieces.
At length these islands became as familiar to those on board as the clouds and the sea. Whenever a strong reflection of white was seen on the skirts of the sky, near the horizon, then ice was sure to be encountered. Notwithstanding which, the substance was not entirely white, but often tinged, especially near the surface of the sea, with a most beautiful sapphirine, or rather beryline blue, evidently reflected from the water. This blue color sometimes appeared twenty or thirty feet above the surface, and was probably produced by particles of sea water, which had been dashed against the mass in tempestuous weather, and had penetrated into its interstices. In the evening, the sun setting just behind one of these masses, tinged its edges with gold, and reflected on the entire mass a beautiful suffusion of purple. In the larger masses were frequently observed shades or casts of white, lying above each other in strata, sometimes of six inches, and at other times of a foot in height.
This appearance seemed to confirm the opinion entertained relative to the increase and accumulation of such huge masses of ice, by heavy falls of snow at different intervals; for snow being of various kinds, small grained, and large grained, in light feathery locks, &c., the various degrees of compactness may account for the various colors of strata. The approximation of several fields of ice, of different magnitudes produces a very singular phenomenon.
The smaller of these masses are forced out of the water, and thrown on the larger ones, until at length an aggregate is formed of a tremendous height. These accumulated bodies of ice float in the sea like so many rugged mountains, and are continually increased in height by the freezing of the spray of the sea, and the melting of the snow which falls on them.
The collision of great fields of ice, in high latitudes is attended by a noise, which for a time, takes away the sense of hearing any thing beside; and that of the smaller fields, with a grinding of unspeakable horror.
The water which dashes against the mountainous ice, freezes into an infinite variety of forms, and presents to the admiring view of the voyager, ideal towns, streets, churches, steeples, and almost every form which imagination can picture to itself.
Our course was very much impeded by immense fields of low ice, the extent of which could scarcely be seen; these low fields, called the meadows, are the sporting grounds of seals, and often hundreds are seen at a time frolicking on them. After passing six weeks in dodging the ice, the wind favored us, and we shaped our course for the island of Juan Fernandez, which lies off the coast of Chili, about 350 miles, is inhabited by a few Spaniards, and is famous as having been the solitary residence of Alexander Selkirk, a Scotchman, whose singular adventure gave rise to a novel known as the adventures of Robinson Crusoe. We spent a few days on shore getting goats, potatoes, fruit, &c., for the ship; from thence we stood for the Sandwich Islands, and came to anchor at Hawaii about the first of April.
Stewart in his Geographical sketch of them, says:—"The Sandwich Islands are situated in the Pacific ocean, between 18° 50' and 22° 20' north latitude, and between 154° 53' and 160° 15', west longitude from Greenwich. They are about 2800 miles distant from the coast of Mexico, on the east; about 5000 from the shores of China, on the west; and 2700 from the Society Islands on the south.
"The Islands are ten in number, stretching, as may be seen from a chart, in a flattened curve, E. S. E., and W. N. W. in the following order: Hawaii, Maui, Molokini, Kahulawe, Lanai, Molokai, Oahu, Kauai, Nihan, and Kaula.
"Hawaii, the most southern and eastern island, is the largest of the group. It is about ninety-seven miles long, and seventy-eight broad, covering a surface of 4000 square miles, and containing 85,000 inhabitants.
"Maui lies northwest from Hawaii, and is separated from it by a channel twenty-four miles wide. This island formed by two mountainous peninsulas, connected by a narrow neck of low land, is forty-eight miles long, and at its greatest width twenty-nine miles wide. It covers about 600 square miles, and is supposed to have a population of 20,000 people.
"Molokini is a barren rock, rising only fifteen or twenty feet above the level of the ocean, at a distance of four or five miles from the western shore of the southern peninsular of Maui. Kahulawe lies in the same direction from Maui, six or eight miles beyond Molokini. It is only eleven miles long, and eight broad, and has but few inhabitants.
"Lanai is situated twenty miles northwest from Kahulawe, and ten or