Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks/Chapter 4
CHAPTER IV
TERRA DEL FUEGO TO OTAHITE
Jan. 21—April 12, 1769
Leave Terra del Fuego—Cape Horn—Albatross and other birds, etc.—Multiplication of Dagysa—Cuttlefish—Cross the line drawn by the Royal Society between the South Sea and the Pacific Ocean—Tropic birds—Occultation of Saturn—Freshness of the water taken on board at Terra del Fuego—Speculations respecting a southern continent—Marine animals—Suicide of a marine—Scurvy—Lemon juice—Lagoon Island—King George III. Island—Means adopted for preventing the scurvy—Preserved cabbage.
21st January 1769. Sailed this morning, the wind foul; but our keeping-boxes being full of new plants, we little regarded any wind, provided it was but moderate enough to let the draughtsmen work, who, to do them justice, are now so used to the sea that it must blow a gale of wind before they leave off.
25th. Wind to-day north-west; stood in with some large islands, but we could not tell for certain whether we saw any part of the mainland. At some distance the land formed a bluff head, within which another appeared, though but faintly, farther to the southward. Possibly that might be Cape Horn, but a fog which overcast it almost immediately after we saw it, hindered our making any material observations upon it; so that all we can say is, that it was the southernmost land we saw, and does not answer badly to the description of Cape Horn given by the French, who place it upon an island, and say that it is two bluff headlands (vide Histoire des Navigat. aux terres australes, tom. i. p. 356). 1st February. Killed Diomedea antarctica, Procellaria lugens and turtur. The first, or black-billed albatross, is much like the common one, but differs in being scarcely half as large, and having a bill entirely black. Procellaria lugens, the southern shearwater, differs from the common kind in being smaller and of a darker colour on the back, but is easily distinguished by the flight, which is heavy, and by two fasciæ or streaks of white, which are very conspicuous when it flies, under its wings. Procellaria turtur, Mother Carey's dove, is of the petrel kind, about the size of a Barbary dove, of a light silvery blue upon the back, which shines beautifully as the bird flies. Its flight is very swift and it remains generally near the surface of the water. More or less of these birds have been seen very often since we left the latitude of Falkland's Island, where in a gale of wind we saw immense quantities of them.
3rd. Shot Diomedea exulans, an albatross, or alcatrace, much larger than those seen to the northward of the Straits of Le Maire, and often quite white on the back between the wings, though certainly the same species; D. antarctica, lesser black-billed albatross; D. profuga, lesser albatross, with a party-coloured bill differing from the last in few things except the bill, the sides of which were yellow, with black between them.
4th. I had been unwell these three or four days, and to-day was obliged to keep the cabin with a bilious attack, which, although quite slight, alarmed me a good deal, as Captain Wallis had such an attack in the Straits of Magellan, which he never got the better of throughout the whole voyage.
5th. I was well enough to eat part of the albatrosses shot on the 3rd; they were so good that everybody commended and ate heartily of them, although there was fresh pork upon the table. To dress them, they are skinned overnight, and the carcases soaked in salt water until morning, then parboiled, and, the water being thrown away, stewed well with very little water, and when sufficiently tender served up with savoury sauce.
9th. This morning some seaweed floated past the ship, and my servant declares that he saw a beetle fly over her. I do not believe he would deceive me, and he certainly knows what a beetle is, as he has these three years been often employed in taking them for me.
15th. Went in the boat and killed Procellaria velox, Nectris munda and fuliginosa, which two last are a new genus between Procellaria and Diomedea: this we reckon a great acquisition to our bird collection.
17th. Saw several porpoises without any "pinna dorsalis," black on the back, white under the belly and on the nose. We saw also an albatross different from any other I have seen, it being black all over, except the head and bill, which were white.
21st. A bird not seen before attended the ship; it was about the size of a pigeon, black above and light-coloured underneath. It darted swiftly along the surface of the water in the same manner as I have observed the Nectris to do, of which genus it is probably a species.
26th. Albatrosses began to be much less plentiful than they have been (lat. 41° 8′).
3rd March. Killed Procellaria velox, velificans, sordida, melanopus, lugens, agilis, and Diomedea exulans. The albatross was very brown, exactly the same as the first I killed, which, if I mistake not, was nearly in the same latitude on the other side of the continent. Caught Holothuria obtusata, Phyllodoce velella, exactly the same as those taken on the other side of the continent, except in size, which in these did not exceed that of an English sixpence. Dagysa vitrea was also the same as that taken off Rio de Janeiro; now, however, we had an opportunity of seeing its extraordinary manner of breeding. The whole progeny, fifteen or twenty in number, hung in a chain from one end of the mother, the oldest only, or the largest, adhering to her, and the rest to each other.
Among a large quantity of birds I had killed (sixty-two in all) I found two Hippobosca, or forest flies, both of one species, and different from any described. More than probably these belonged to the birds, and came off with them from the land. I found also this day a large Sepia, or cuttlefish, lying in the water, just dead, but so pulled to pieces by the birds that its species could not be determined. Only this I know, that of it was made one of the best soups I ever ate. It was very large; and its arms, instead of being like the European species, furnished with suckers, were armed with a double row of very sharp talons, resembling in shape those of a cat, and like them, retractable into a sheath of skin, from whence they might be thrust at pleasure.
The weather has now become pleasantly warm, and the barnacles on the ship's bottom seem to regenerate, very few of the old ones remaining alive, but young ones without number, scarcely bigger than lentils.
5th. It now begins to be very hot; thermometer 70°, and damp, with prodigious dews at night, greater than any I have felt. This renews our uncomfortably damp situation, everything beginning to mould, as it did about the equinoctial line in the Atlantic.
7th. No albatrosses have been seen since the 4th, and for some days before that we had only now and then a single one in sight, so we conclude that we have parted with them for good and all.
11th. A steady breeze had blown during the last three days, and there was no sea at all; from whence we concluded that we had passed the line drawn between the Great South Sea and the Pacific Ocean by the Council of the Royal Society; notwithstanding we are not yet within the tropics.
13th. I saw a tropic bird for the first time hovering over the ship, but flying very high: if my eyes did not deceive me it differed from that described by Linnæus (Phaëton aetherius), in having the long feathers of his tail red. The servants with a dipping net took Mimus volutator and Phyllodoce velella, both exactly the same as those we saw in the Atlantic Ocean (lat. 30° 45′, long. 126° 23′ 45″).
15th. This night there was an occultation of Saturn by the moon, which Mr. Green observed, but was unlucky in having the weather so cloudy that the observation was good for little or nothing.
16th. Our water which had been taken on board at Terra del Fuego has remained until this time perfectly good without the least change, which I am told is very rare, especially when, as in our case, water is brought from a cold climate into a hot one; ours, however, has stood it without any damage, and drinks as brisk and pleasant as when first taken on board, or better, for the red colour it had at first has subsided, and it is now as clear as any English spring water.
20th. When I look on the charts of these seas, and mark our course, which has been nearly straight at N.W. since we left Cape Horn, I cannot help wondering that we have not yet seen land. It is, however, some pleasure to be able to disprove that which only exists in the opinions of theoretical writers, as are most of those who have written anything about these seas without having themselves been in them. They have generally supposed that every foot of sea over which they believed no ship to have passed to be land, although they had little or nothing to support that opinion, except vague reports, many of them mentioned only as such by the authors who first published them. For instance, the Orange Tree, one of the Nassau fleet, having been separated from her companions, and driven to the westward, reported on her joining them again that she had twice seen the Southern continent; both these places are laid down by Mr. Dalrymple many degrees to the eastward of our track, yet it is probable that he put them down as far to the westward as he thought it possible that the Orange Tree could have gone.
To strengthen these weak arguments another theory has been started, according to which as much of the South Sea as its authors call land must necessarily be so, for otherwise this world would not be properly balanced, since the quantity of earth known to be situated in the northern hemisphere would not have a counterpoise in this. The number of square degrees of their land which we have already changed into water sufficiently disproves this, and teaches me at least, that till we know how this globe is fixed in that place which has been since its creation assigned to it in the general system, we need not be anxious to give reasons how any one part of it counterbalances the rest.
21st. Took Turbo fluitans, floating on the water in the same manner as Helix ianthina, Medusa porpita, exactly like that taken on the other side of the continent, and a small Climex, which had also been taken before. This last appears to be a larva; if so, it is probably of some animal that lives under water, as I saw many, but none that appeared perfect.
On Phaëton erubescens were plenty of a very curious kind of Acarus phaëtonis, which either was or appeared to be viviparous. Besides what was shot to day, there were seen man-of-war birds (Pelecanus aquilus), and a small bird of the Sterna kind, called by the seamen egg-birds; they were white with red beaks, and about the size of Sterna hirundo. Of these I saw several just at nightfall, flying very high and following one another, all standing towards the N.N.W.; probably there is land in that direction, as we were not far from the spot where Quiros saw his southernmost islands, Incarnation and St. John Baptist.
24th. The officer of the watch reported that in the middle watch the water, from being roughish, became suddenly as smooth as a mill pond, so that the ship, from going only four knots, at once increased to six, though there was little or no more wind than before. A log of wood also which was seen by several people to pass the ship made them believe that there was land to windward. When I came on deck at eight o'clock the signs were all gone. I saw, however, two birds which seemed to be of the Sterna kind, both very small, one quite white and the other quite black, which from their appearance could not venture far from land.
To-day by our reckoning we crossed the tropic.
25th. This evening one of our marines threw himself overboard, and was not missed until it was much too late even to attempt to recover him. He was a very young man, scarcely twenty-one years of age, remarkably quiet and industrious, and, to make his exit more melancholy, was driven to the rash resolution by an accident so trifling that it must appear incredible to everybody who is not well acquainted with the powerful effects that shame can work upon young minds.
This day at noon he was sentry at the cabin door, and while he was on that duty, one of the captain's servants, being called away in a hurry, left a piece of sealskin in his charge, which it seems he was going to cut up to make tobacco pouches, some of which he had promised to several of the men. The poor young fellow had several times asked him for one, and when refused had told him that since he refused him so trifling a thing, he would, if he could, steal one from him. This he put into practice as soon as the skin was given into his charge, and was of course found out immediately, as the other returned and took the piece he had cut off from him, but declared that he would not complain to the officers for so trifling a cause. In the meantime the fact came to the ears of his fellow-soldiers, thirteen in number, who stood up for the honour of their corps so highly that before night they drove the young fellow almost mad by representing his crime in the blackest colours as a breach of trust of the worst description. A theft committed by a sentry on duty they made him think a most inexcusable crime, especially when the thing stolen had been given into his charge. The sergeant particularly declared that if the person aggrieved would not complain, he would himself do so, for people should not suffer scandal from the ill-behaviour of one. This affected the young man much, and he went to his hammock; soon after the sergeant called him on deck; he got up, and slipping past the sergeant, went forward; it was dusk, and the people were not convinced that he had gone overboard till half an hour after the event.
31st. Myself not quite so well; a little inflammation in my throat, and swelling of the glands.
1st April. Somewhat better to-day. As my complaint has something in it that puts me in mind of the scurvy, I took up the lemon-juice put up by Dr. Hulme's direction, and found that that which was concentrated by evaporating six gallons into less than two has kept as well as anything could do. The small cag, in which was lemon-juice with one-fifth of brandy, was also very good, though a large part of it had leaked out by some fault in the cag: this, therefore, I began to make use of immediately, drinking very weak punch made with it for my common liquor.
4th. At ten this morning my servant, Peter Briscoe, saw land which we had almost passed by; we stood towards it, and found it to be a small island (Lagoon Island) about a mile and a half or two miles in length; those who were upon the topmast-head perceived it to be nearly circular, and to have a lagoon or pool of water in the middle, which occupied by far the largest part of the island. About noon we were close to it, within a mile or thereabouts, and distinctly saw inhabitants, of whom we counted twenty-four; they appeared to us through our glasses to be tall and to have very large heads, or possibly much hair upon them; eleven of them walked along the beach abreast of the ship, each with a pole or pike as long again as himself in his hand. Every one of them was stark naked, and appeared of a brown copper colour; as soon, however, as the ship had fairly passed the island they retired higher up on the beach and seemed to put on some clothes, or at least cover themselves with something which made them appear of a light colour.
The island was covered with trees of many different verdures: the palms or cocoanut trees we could plainly distinguish, particularly two that were amazingly taller than their fellows, and at a distance bore a great resemblance to flags. The land seemed very low; though at a distance several parts of it had appeared high, yet when we came near them they proved to be clumps of palms. Under the shade of these were the houses of the natives, in spots cleared of all underwood, so that pleasanter groves cannot be imagined, at least so they appeared to us, whose eyes had so long been unused to any other object than water and sky.
After dinner, land was again seen, with which we came up at sunset; it proved a small island, not more than three-quarters of a mile in length, but almost round. We ran within less than a mile of it, but saw no signs of inhabitants, or any cocoanut trees, or indeed any that bore the least resemblance to palms, though there were many sorts of trees, or at least many varieties of verdure.
In the neighbourhood of both this and the other island were many birds, man-of-war birds, and a small black sort of Sterna with a white spot on its head, which the seamen called noddies, but said that they were much smaller than the West Indian noddies.
While we were near the island a large fish was taken with a towing-line baited with a piece of pork rind cut like a swallow's tail; the seamen called it a king-fish (Scomber lanceolatus).
9th. It is now almost night, and time for me to wind up the clue of my this day's lucubrations; so, as we have found no island, I shall employ the time and paper which I had allotted to describe one in a work which I am sure will be more useful, if not more entertaining, to all future navigators, by describing the method which we took to cure cabbage in England. This cabbage we have eaten every day since we left Cape Horn, and have now good store remaining; as good, to our palates at least, and fully as green and pleasing to the eye as if it were bought fresh every morning at Covent Garden Market. Our steward has given me the receipt, which I shall copy exactly—false spelling excepted.
Take a strong iron-bound cask, for no weak or wooden-bound one should ever be trusted in a long voyage. Take out the head, and when the whole is well cleaned, cover the bottom with salt; then take the cabbage, and, stripping off the outside leaves, take the rest leaf by leaf till you come to the heart, which cut into four. Lay these leaves and heart about two or three inches thick upon the salt, and sprinkle salt freely over them; then lay cabbage upon the salt, stratum super stratum, till the cask is full. Then lay on the head of the cask with a weight which, in five or six days, will have pressed the cabbage into a much smaller compass. After this, fill up the cask with more cabbage, as before directed, and head it up.
N.B.—The cabbage should be gathered in dry weather, some time after sunrise, so that the dew may not be upon it. Halves of cabbages are better for keeping than single leaves.
10th. Weather very hazy and thick: about nine it cleared up a little, and showed us Osnaburg Island, discovered by the Dolphin in her last voyage. About one o'clock land was seen ahead in the direction of George's Land; it was, however, so faint that very few could see it.
11th. Up at five this morning to examine a shark caught yesterday evening: it proves to be a blue shark (Squalus glaucus). To-day we caught two more, which were the common gray shark (Squalus carcharias), on one of which were some sucking-fish (Echeneis remora). The seamen tell us that the blue shark is the worst of all to eat; indeed, its smell is abominably strong, so as we have two of the better sort it was hove overboard.
As I am now on the brink of going ashore after a long passage, thank God, in as good health as man can be, I shall fill a little paper in describing the means which I have taken to prevent the scurvy in particular.
The ship was supplied by the Admiralty with sour-crout, of which I eat constantly, till our salted cabbage was opened, which I preferred: as a pleasant substitute, wort was served out almost constantly, and of this I drank a pint or more every evening, but all this did not check the distemper so entirely as to prevent my feeling some small effect of it. About a fortnight ago my gums swelled, and some small pimples rose on the inside of my mouth, which threatened to become ulcers; I then flew to the lemon juice, which had been put up for me according to Dr. Hulme's method, described in his book, and in his letter, which is inserted here.[1] Every kind of liquor which I used was made sour with the lemon juice No. 3, so that I took nearly six ounces a day of it; the effect of this was surprising, in less than a week my gums became as firm as ever, and at this time I am troubled with nothing but a few pimples on my face, which have not deterred me from leaving off the juice entirely.
- ↑ To J. Banks, Esq., Burlington Street.—Sir—The vessels containing the orange and lemon juice, sent by Dr. Fothergill, were to be marked, that you might know their contents; but lest in the hurry of sending them that circumstance should have been neglected, I will take the liberty to explain them.
The case No. 1 contains six gallons of lemon juice evaporated down to less than two gallons. The large cask, No. 2, contains seven gallons of orange juice and one gallon of brandy. The small cask, No. 3, contains five quarts of lemon juice and one of brandy.
When you come to make use of the juice which is in the casks, do not open the bung-hole, but draw it off at the end of the cask by means of a wooden cock, and make a vent-hole with a peg in it at the top of the cask; and always observe this method when you draw off the juice you keep in casks. It would not be amiss if you were to take out with you several wooden cocks, lest any should be lost or broken; and perhaps two or three strong iron-bound casks, holding ten gallons apiece, might be very useful for taking in a quantity of orange, lemon or lime juice, when you touch at any place abroad where those fruits grow. Besides the juices I would recommend to you to carry out a quantity of molasses, and two or three pounds of the best Ohio and Strasburg turpentine, in order to brew beer with for your daily drink when your water becomes bad. So small a quantity of molasses as two gallons, or two gallons and a half, are said to be sufficient for making an hogshead of tolerably good beer, and this method of brewing beer at sea will be peculiarly useful in case you should have stinking water on board; for I find by experiments that the smell of stinking water will be entirely destroyed by the process of fermentation. I sincerely wish you and your companions a most prosperous voyage and a safe return to old England, loaded with all the honours you so justly deserve,—and am, sir, your most humble servant,N. Hulme.Hatton Garden, August 1, 1768.