with them in observing the conditions we had agreed on; norwould we let any of our men so much as go on board them, or suffer anyof their men to come on board us; for, had any of our men gone on board,nobody could have answered for their behaviour, any more than if theyhad been on shore in an enemy's country.
We were now victualled for our voyage; and, as we mattered not purchase,we went merrily on for the coast of Ceylon, where we intended to touch,to get fresh water again, and more provisions; and we had nothingmaterial offered in this part of the voyage, only that we met withcontrary winds, and were above a month in the passage.
We put in upon the south coast of the island, desiring to have as littleto do with the Dutch as we could; and as the Dutch were lords of thecountry as to commerce, so they are more so of the sea-coast, where theyhave several forts, and, in particular, have all the cinnamon, which isthe trade of that island.
We took in fresh water here, and some provisions, but did not muchtrouble ourselves about laying in any stores, our beef and hogs, whichwe got at Java, being not yet all gone by a good deal. We had a littleskirmish on shore here with some of the people of the island, some ofour men having been a little too familiar with the homely ladies of thecountry; for homely, indeed, they were, to such a degree, that if ourmen had not had good stomachs that way, they would scarce have touchedany of them.
I could never fully get it out of our men what they did, they were sotrue to one another in their wickedness, but I understood in the main,that it was some barbarous thing they had done, and that they had liketo have paid dear for it, for the men resented it to the last degree,and gathered in such numbers about them, that, had not sixteen more ofour men, in another boat, come all in the nick of time, just to rescueour first men, who were but eleven, and so fetch them off by main force,they had been all cut off, the inhabitants being no less than two orthree hundred, armed with darts and lances, the usual weapons of thecountry, and which they are very dexterous at the throwing, even sodexterous that it was scarce credible; and had our men stood to fightthem, as some of them were bold enough to talk of, they had been alloverwhelmed and killed. As it was, seventeen of our men were wounded,and some of them very dangerously. But they were more frighted than hurttoo, for every one of them gave themselves over for dead men, believingthe lances were poisoned. But William was our comfort here too; for,when two of our surgeons were of the same opinion, and told the menfoolishly enough that they would die, William cheerfully went to workwith them, and cured them all but one, who rather died by drinking somearrack punch than of his wound; the excess of drinking throwing him intoa fever.
We had enough of Ceylon, though some of our people were for goingashore again, sixty or seventy men together, to be revenged; but Williampersuaded them against it; and his reputation was so great among themen, as well as with us that were commanders, that he could influencethem more than any of us.
They were mighty warm upon their revenge, and they would go on shore,and destroy five hundred of them. "Well," says William, "and suppose youdo, what are you the better?" "Why, then," says one of them, speakingfor the rest, "we shall have our satisfaction." "Well, and what will yoube the better for that?" says William. They could then say nothing tothat. "Then," says William, "if I mistake not, your business is money;now, I desire to know, if you conquer and kill two or three thousand ofthese poor creatures, they have no money, pray what will you get? Theyare poor naked wretches; what shall you gain by them? But then," saysWilliam, "perhaps, in doing this, you may chance to lose half-a-score ofyour own company, as it is very probable you may. Pray, what gain isin it? and what account can you give the captain for his lost men?" Inshort, William argued so effectually, that he convinced them that itwas mere murder to do so; and that the men had a right to their own,and that they had no right to take them away; that it was destroyinginnocent men, who had acted no otherwise than as the laws of naturedictated; and that it would be as much murder to do so, as to meet a manon the highway, and kill him, for the mere sake of it, in cold blood,not regarding whether he had done any wrong to us or no.
These reasons prevailed with them at last, and they were content togo away, and leave them as they found them. In the first skirmish theykilled between sixty and seventy men, and wounded a great many more; butthey had nothing, and our people got nothing by it, but the loss of oneman's life, and the wounding sixteen more, as above.
But another accident brought us to a necessity of further business withthese people, and indeed we had like to have put an end to our livesand adventures all at once among them; for, about three days after ourputting out to sea from the place where we had that skirmish, wewere attacked by a violent storm of wind from the south, or rather ahurricane of wind from all the points southward, for it blew in a mostdesperate and furious manner from the S.E. to the S.W., one minute atone point, and then instantly turning about again to another point,but with the same violence; nor were we able to work the ship in thatcondition, so that the ship I was in split three top-sails, and at lastbrought the main-top-mast by the board; and, in a word, we were once ortwice driven right ashore; and one time, had not the wind shifted thevery moment it did, we had been dashed in a thousand pieces upon a greatledge of rocks which lay off about half-a-league from the shore; but,as I have said, the wind shifting very often, and at that time comingto the E.S.E., we stretched off, and got above a league more sea-room inhalf-an-hour. After that, it blew with some fury S.W. by S., then S.W.by W., and put us back again a great way to the eastward of the ledgeof rocks, where we found a great opening between the rocks and the land,and endeavoured to come to an anchor there, but we found there was noground fit to anchor in, and that we should lose our anchors, therebeing nothing but rocks. We stood through the opening, which held aboutfour leagues. The storm continued, and now we found a dreadful foulshore, and knew not what course to take. We looked out very narrowlyfor some river or creek or bay, where we might run in, and come to ananchor, but found none a great while. At length we saw a great headlandlie out far south into the sea, and that to such a length, that, inshort, we saw plainly that, if the wind held where it was, we could notweather it, so we ran in as much under the lee of the point as we could,and came to an anchor in about twelve fathom water.
But the wind veering again in the night, and blowing exceedingly hard,our anchors came home, and the ship drove till the rudder struck againstthe ground; and had the ship gone half her length farther she had beenlost, and every one of us with her. But our sheet-anchor held its own,and we heaved in some of the cable, to get clear of the ground we hadstruck upon. It was by this only cable that we rode it out all night;and towards morning we thought the wind abated a little; and it was wellfor us that it was so, for, in spite of what our sheet-anchor did forus, we found the ship fast aground in the morning, to our very greatsurprise and amazement.
When the tide was out, though the water here ebbed away, the ship layalmost dry upon a bank of hard sand, which never, I suppose, had anyship upon it before. The people of the country came down in greatnumbers to look at us and gaze, not knowing what we were, but gaping atus as at a great sight or wonder at which they were surprised, and knewnot what to do.
I have reason to believe that upon the sight they immediately sent anaccount of a ship being there, and of the condition we were in, for thenext day there appeared a great man; whether it was their king or noI know not, but he had abundance of men with him, and some with longjavelins in their hands as long as half-pikes; and these came all downto the water's edge, and drew up in a very good order, just in our view.They stood near an hour without making any motion; and then there camenear twenty of them, with a man before them carrying a white flag. Theycame forward into the water as high as their waists, the sea not goingso high as before, for the wind was abated, and blew off the shore.
The man made a long oration to us, as we could see by his gestures; andwe sometimes heard his voice, but knew not one word he said. William,who was always useful to us, I believe was here again the saving of al
lour lives. The case was this: The fellow, or what I might call him, whenhis speech was done, gave three great screams (for I know not what elseto say they were), then lowered his white flag three times, and thenmade three motions to us with his arm to come to him.
I acknowledge that I was for manning out the boat and going to them, butWilliam would by no means allow me. He told me we ought to trust nobody;that, if they were barbarians, and under their own government, we mightbe sure to be all murdered; and, if they were Christians, we should notfare much better, if they knew who we were; that it was the custom ofthe Malabars to betray all people that they could get into their hands,and that these were some of the same people; and that, if we had anyregard to our own safety, we should not go to them by any means. Iopposed him a great while, and told him I thought he used to be alwaysright, but that now I thought he was not; that I was no more for