Page:Narrative of an Official Visit to Guatemala.djvu/78

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58
OFFICIAL VISIT
[CH. V.

stood out of the bay. By the 6th, it was calculated we had made half the voyage to the port of Sonsonate, to which we were bound.

At four o'clock in the morning of the 7th, the great volcano of Guatemala was in sight; we were then about eighteen leagues from the shore. The coast is not very accurately laid down in the charts; at least, there was a variation between them and the ship's reckoning of seventy miles, in this short voyage. I procured from Mr. James, a midshipman, a copy of an improved plan which he had formed of the coast from Acapulco to Sonsonate[1]. We had run the distance exactly in five days, having had fair light winds all the way.

About midday on the 9th, we came to anchor off the port, or rather open roadstead, of Acajutla. At eight o'clock the next morning, Lieut. Morgan went ashore with part of my baggage. There happened to be, at the time, a great concourse of people

  1. The map, made for this work, has been formed from the best charts, collated with this improvement.