i?74-
N o v em b e r ; efcapes, feemed to animate us with new Promethean fire.
The run from New Zeeland to Tierra del Fuego furpaffed
our warmeft expeditions, and, confidefing the conftrudtion
of our fhip, which was always reckoned a dull failor, was
indeed one of the quiekeft paffages which can be imagined,
as we made one day with another upwards of forty leagues.
We faw a whale on the 12th, about twelve yards long,
with an oblong blunt head, on which were two longitudinal
furrows, and as many upright ridges. It had fmall
eyes, two femilunar apertures, from whence it occafionally
fpouted the water, and was mottled all over with white
fpots. It had two large fins behind the head, but none on
the back. This extraordinary creature feems to have been
intirely unknown before.
We had fprung a leak on going out of Queen Charlotte’s.
Sound, which we difcovered on the 14th ; but it gave us
very little uneafinefs, as the water in the pump-well en-
ereafed only five inches in eight hours. The wefterly winds
blew with aftonilhing violence, and the breadth of the ocean
being very confiderable, the billows encreafed to an im-
inenfc fize, and feemed to be fometimes feveral hundred
yards long. The fhip rolled very difagreeably when the
wind was quite af t ; and though it has been fuppofed that
a fhip’s inclination in the greateft roll never exceeds twenty
degrees, we have obferved it inclined above thirty, and feveral
times even to forty degrees.
During
During this run we faw birds of the albatrofs, petrel,
and pinguin kinds, almoft every day, and especially at equal
diftances from New Zeeland and America, which are about
fifteen hundred leagues afunder. On the 27 th of November
we made a greater run than ever was made in our fhip
before, which confifted of 1 84 miles by the log.
On the 2d of December, after a fliort calm, we had a
frefh breeze, which continued to blow without intermifiion,
but with different degrees of velocity, till the 1 8 th, when
we made .the land, a little after midnight, near Cape De-
feado, on one of the weftermoft iflands of Tierra del Fuego.
The fi£h which we had falted at New Zeeland had lafted
during the whole run, and we had found great benefit
from living upon them preferably to fait beef and pork,
which was now fo univerfally loathed, that captain Cook
himfelf declared he fliould probably never eat it again with
any degree of fatisfadion. The four-krout had been con-
ftantly ufed in the mean while, and the wort had been taken
as a prefervative by many perfons in the fhip. The former
was ftill as good as ever, but the malt was much damaged,
and had loft part-of its efficacy, by having been put
up in green unfeafoned calks. I drank plentifully of it,
but was notwithftanding afflifted with confiderable fwell-
ings in the legs, attended with pains, which returned from
time to time.
N o v>7e7m4*b e r ,
D ecember.
Sunday z8;
Q j l f i 2
The