But we found afterwards that we need not take such pains for water,for a little higher up the creek where we were we found the water fresh when the tide was out,which flowed but a little way up;so we filled our jars,and feasted on the hare we had killed,and prepared to go on our way,having seen no footsteps of any human creature in that part of the country.
As I had been one voyage to this coast before,I knew very well that the islands of the Canaries,and the Cape de Verde Islands also,lay not far off from the coast.But as I had no instruments to take an observation to know what latitude we were in,and did not exactly know,or at least remember,what latitude they were in,I knew not where to look for them,or when to stand off to sea towards them;otherwise I might now easily have found some of these islands.But my hope was,that if I stood along this coast till I came to that part where the English traded,I should find some of their vessels upon their usual design of trade,that would relieve and take us in.
By the best of my calculation,that place where I now was must be that country which,lying between the Emperor of Morocco's dominions and the negroes,lies waste and uninhabited,except by wild beasts;the negroes having abandoned it and gone farther south for fear of the Moors,and the Moors not thinking it worth inhabiting,by reason of its barrenness;and indeed both forsaking it because of the prodigious numbers of tigers,lions,leopards,and other furious creatures which harbour there;so that the Moors use it for their hunting only,where they go like an army,two or three thousand men at a time;and indeed for near an hundred miles together upon this coast we saw nothing but a waste uninhabited country by day,and heard nothing but howlings and roarings of wild beasts by night.
Once or twice in the daytime I thought I saw the Pico of Teneriffe,being the high top of the Mountain Teneriffe in the Canaries,and had a great mind to venture out,in hopes of reaching thither;but having tried twice,I was forced in again by contrary winds,the sea also going too high for my little vessel;so I resolved to pursue my first design,and keep along the shore.
Several times I was obliged to land for fresh water after we had left this place;and once in particular,being early in the morning,we came to an anchor under a little point of land which was pretty high;and the tide beginning to flow,we lay still to go farther in.Xury,whose eyes were more about him than it seems mine were,calls softly to me,and tells me that we had best go farther off the shore;‘For,’says he,‘look,yonder lies a dreadful monster on the side of that hillock fast asleep.’I looked where he pointed,and saw a dreadful monster indeed,for it was a terrible great lion that lay on the side of the shore,under the shade of a piece of the hill that hung as it were a little over him.‘Xury,’says I,‘you shall go on shore and kill him.’Xury looked frighted,and said,‘Me kill!he eat me at one mouth’;one mouthfull he meant.However,I said no more to the boy,but bade him lie still,and I took our biggest gun,which was almost musket bore,and loaded it with a good charge of powder,and with two slugs,and laid it down;then I loaded another gun with two bullets;and the third (for we had three pieces)I loaded with five smaller bullets.I took the best aim I could with the first piece to have shot him into the head,but he lay so with his leg raised a little above his nose,that the slugs hit his leg about the knee,and broke the bone.He started up growling at first,but finding his leg broke,fell down again,and then got up upon three legs and gave the most hideous roar that ever I heard.I was a little surprised that I had not hit him on the head.However,I took up the second piece immediately,and,though he began to move off,fired again,and shot him into the head,and had the pleasure to see him drop,and make but little noise,but lay struggling for life.Then Xury took heart,and would have me let him go on shore.‘Well,go,’said I;so the boy jumped into the water,and taking a little gun in one hand,swam to shore with the other hand,and coming close to the creature,put the muzzle of the piece to his ear,and shot him into the head again,which despatched him quite.
This was game indeed to us,but this was no food;and I was very sorry to lose three charges of powder and shot upon a creature that was good for nothing to us.However,Xury said he would have some of him;so he comes on board,and asked me to give him the hatchet.‘For what,Xury?’said I.‘Me cut off his head,’said he.However,Xury could not cut off his head,but he cut off a foot,and brought it with him,and it was a monstrous great one.
I bethought myself,however,that perhaps the skin of him might one way or other be of some value to us;and I resolved to take off his skin if I could.So Xury and I went to work with him;but Xury was much the better workman at it,for I knew very ill how to do it.Indeed,it took us up both the whole day,but at last we got off the hide of him,and spreading it on the top of our cabin,the sun effectually dried it in two days'time,and it afterwards served me to lie upon.
