from it, mountains high: Happily for us a fresh gale sprung up at south-east, with which, to our great joy, we were able to stand off; and it behoves whoever shall afterwards come this way, to give the north part of this island a good birth. After I had got to some distance, the weather being thick, and it raining very hard, I brought-to. Our latitude was now 51° S. and longitude 63° 22 W.

On Monday the 14th, the weather having cleared up, and the wind shifted to the S.S. W. we steered along the shore S.E. by E. four miles, and saw a low flat island full of high tufts of grass, resembling bushes, bearing south, at the distance of two or three leagues, the northermost land at the same time bearing west, distant about six leagues: We had here thirty-eight fathom, with rocky ground. We continu→ ed our course along the shore six leagues farther, and then saw a low rocky island bearing S.E. by E. distant about five miles: Here we brought-to, and having sounded, we had forty fathom water, with a bottom of white sand. This island is about three leagues distant from the land we were coasting, which here forms a very deep bay, and bears E. by N. of the other island on which we had seen the long tufts of grass: We saw the sea break at a good distance from the shore, and during the night stood off and on. The next morning at three o'clock we made sail, and stood in for the land to look for a harbour. At six, the east end of the rocky island bore W.S.W. distant about three miles, and our soundings then were sixteen fathom, with rocky ground; but when we got within the island we had twenty fathom, with fine white sand. The coast from this rocky island lies E. by S. distant about seven or eight leagues, where there are two low islands, which make the eastermost land in sight. At eight o'clock we saw an opening, which had the appearance of an harbour, bearing E.S. E. and being between two and three leagues distant. Upon this discovery we brought to, and sent a boat from each of the ships to examine the opening; but it beginning to blow very hard soon after, and the weather growing thick, with heavy rain, we were obliged to stand out to sea with both the ships, and it was not without great difficulty that we cleared the two rocky islands which were to the eastward of us. We had now a great sea, and I began to be under much concern lest we should be blown off, and our people in the boats left behind: However, about three in the afternoon, the weather clearing

up,

up, I tacked and stood in again, and presently after had the satisfaction to see one of the boats, though it was a long way to leeward of us. I immediately bore down to her, and found her to be the Tamar's boat, with Mr Hindman, the second lieutenant, on board, who having been on shore in the opening, had ventured off, notwithstanding the great sea and bad weather, to inform me that he had found a fine harbour: We immediately stood in for it, and found it equally beyond his report and our expectations; the entrance is about a mile over, and every part of it is perfectly safe, the depth of water, close to the shore, being from ten to seven fathom. We found this harbour to consist of two little bays on the starboard side, where ships may anchor in great safety, and in each of which there is a fine rivulet of fresh water. Soon after we entered an harbour of much greater extent, which I called Port Egmont, in honour of the earl, who was then first lord of the Admiralty; and I think it is one of the finest harbours in the world. The mouth of it is S.E. distant seven leagues from the low rocky island, which is a good mark to know it by: Within the island, and at the distance of about two miles from the shore, there is between seventeen and eighteen fathom water; and about three leagues to the westward of the harbour, there is a remarkable white sandy beach, off which a ship may anchor till there is an opportunity to run in. In standing in for this sandy beach, the two low rocky islands, which we found it difficult to clear when the weather obliged us to stand off, appear to the eastward, and Port Egmont is about sixteen leagues from the north end of these islands. We moored in ten fathom, with fine holding ground. The northermost point of the western shore was distant two miles and a half, the watering-place on that shore bore W.N.W. W. and was dis tant half a mile, and the islands on the east side bore E. by S. and were distant four miles. The whole navy of England might ride here in perfect security from all winds. Soon after the ship came to an anchor, the other boat which had remained on shore when Mr Hindman put off, came on board. In the southermost part of the harbour there are several islands, but there is no passage out for a ship; I went, however, through in my boat, about seven leagues distant from where the ship lay, and entered a large sound, which is too much exposed to a westerly wind for ships to lie in it safely; and the master of the Tamar, who had been round

1

round in her boat, and entered this sound from without, reported that many shoals lay off it, so that if the harbour was ever so good, it would not be prudent to attempt getting in. In every part of Port Egmont there is fresh water in the greatest plenty, and geese, ducks, snipes, and other birds are so numerous, that our people grew tired of them: It was a common thing for a boat to bring off sixty or seventy fine geese, without expending a single charge of powder and shot, for the men knocked down as many as they pleased with stones: Wood, however, is wanting here, except a little that is found adrift along the shore, which I imagined came from the Straits of Magellan. Among other refreshments, which are in the highest degree salutary to those who have contracted scorbutic disorders, during a long voyage, here are wild celery, and wood sorrel, in the greatest abundance; nor is there vany want of mussels, clams, cockles, and limpets: The seals and penguins are innumerable, so that it is impossible to walk upon the beach without first driving them away: And the coast abounds with sea-lions, many of which are of an enormous size. We found this animal very formidable; I was once attacked by one of them very unexpectedly, and it was with the utmost difficulty that I could disengage myself from him: At other times we had many battles with them, and it has sometimes afforded a dozen of us an hour's work to dispatch one of them: I had with me a very fine mastiff dog, and a bite of one of these creatures almost tore him to pieces. Nor were these the only dangerous animals that we found here, for the master having been sent out one day to sound the coast upon the south shore, reported, at his return, that four creatures of great fierceness, resembling wolves, ran up to their bellies in the water to attack the people in his boat, and that as they happened to have no fire-arms with them, they had immediately put the boat off into deep water. The next morning after this happened, I went upon the southern shore myself, where we found one of the largest sea-lions I had ever seen: As the boat's crew were now well armed, they immediately engaged him, and during the contest one of the other animals was seen running towards us: He was fired at before he came up, and was presently killed, though I afterwards wished that we had endeavoured to take him alive, which, if we had been aware of his attack, I dare say might easily have been done. When any of these creatures

got

got sight of our people, though at ever so great a distance, they ran directly at them; and no less than five of them were killed this day. They were always called wolves by the ship's company, but, except in their size, and the shape of the tail, I think they bore a greater resemblance to a fox. They are as big as a middle-sized mastiff, and their fangs are remarkably long and sharp. There are great numbers of them upon this coast, though it is not perhaps easy to guess how they first came hither, for these islands are at least one hundred leagues distant from the main: They burrow in the ground like a fox, and we have frequently seen pieces of seal which they have mangled, and the skins of penguins, die scattered about the mouth of their holes. To get rid of these creatures, our people set fire to the grass, so that the country was in a blaze as far as the eye could reach, for several days, and we could see them running in great numbers to seek other quarters. I dug holes in many places, about two feet deep, ito examine the soil, which I found first a black mold, and then a light clay. While we lay here, we set up the armourer's forge on shore, and completed a great deal of iron-work that was much wanted. Our people had every morning an excellent breakfast made of portable soup, and wild celery, thickened with oatmeal: Neither was our attention confined wholly to ourselves, for the surgeon of the Tamar surrounded a piece of ground near the watering-place with a fence of turf, and planted it with many esculent vegetables as a garden, for the benefit of those who might hereafter come to this place. Of this harbour, and all the neighbouring islands, I took possession for his majesty King George the Third of Great Britain, by the name of Falkland's Islands; and there is, I think, little reason to doubt that they are the same land to which Cowley gave the name of Pepys's Island. Bontere

1

we

In the printed account of Cowley's voyage, he says, held our course S.W. till we came into the latitude of fortyseven degrees, where we saw land, the same being an island, not before known, lying to the westward of us : It was not inhabited, and I gave it the name of Pepys's Island. We found it a very commodious place for ships to water at, and take

"Many of them began to spring up very fast, and we have since heard, that some persons who arrived there after our departure, eat of those roots and sallad."

take in wood, and it has a very good harbour, where a thousand sail of ships may safely ride. Here is great plenty of fowls, and, we judge, abundance of fish, by reason of the ground's being nothing but rocks and sands."

To this account there is annexed a representation of Pepys's Island, in which names are given to several points and head-lands, and the harbour is called Admiralty Bay; yet it appears that Cowley had only a distant view of it, for he immediately adds, "the wind being so extraordinary high that we could not get into it to water, we stood to the southward, shaping our course S.S.W. till we came into the latitude of 53°;" and though he says that "it was commodious to take in wood," and it is known that there is no wood on Falkland's Islands, Pepys's Island and Falkland's Islands may notwithstanding be the same; for upon Falkland's Islands there are immense quantities of flags with narrow leaves, reeds and rushes which grow in clusters, so as to form bushes about three feet high, and then shoot about six or seven feet higher: These at a distance have greatly the appearance of wood, and were taken for wood by the French, who landed there in the year 1764, as appears by Pernetty's account of their voyage. It has been suggested that the latitude of Pepys's Island might, in the MS. from which the account of Cowley's voyage was printed, be expressed in figures, which, if ill made, might equally resemble forty-seven, and fifty-one; and therefore as there is no island in these seas in latitude forty-seven, and as Falkland's Islands lie nearly in fifty-one, that fifty-one might reasonably be concluded to be the number for which the figures were intended to stand: Recourse therefore was had

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Bougainville, who had the command of the expedition here referred to, says, "The same illusion which made Hawkins, Woods Rogers, and others believe that these isles were covered with wood, acted likewise upon my fellow voyagers. We were surprised when we landed, to see that what we took for woods as we sailed along the coast, was nothing but bushes of a tall rush, standing very close together. The bottom of its stalks being dried, got the colour of a dead leaf to the height of about five feet; and from thence springs the tuft of rushes, which crown this stalk; so that at a distance, these stalks together have the appearance of a wood of middling height. These rushes only grow near the sea side, and on little isles ; the mountains on the main land are, in some parts, covered all over with heath, which are easily mistaken for bushes."-Forster's Translation, where a pretty interesting account of these islands (called Malouines) is to be found.-E.