полная версия

Anson George
A Voyage Round the World

CHAPTER II
OUR ARRIVAL AT TINIAN, AND AN ACCOUNT OF THE ISLAND AND OF OUR PROCEEDINGS THERE TILL THE "CENTURION" DROVE OUT TO SEA

It was the 26th of August, 1742, in the morning, when we lost sight of the island of Anatacan, dreading that it was the last land we should ever fix our eyes on. But the next morning we discovered three other islands to the eastward, which were between ten and fourteen leagues distant from us. These were, as we afterwards learnt, the island of Saypan, Tinian, and Aguigan. We immediately steered towards Tinian, which was the middlemost of the three; but we had so much of calms and light airs, that though we were helped forwards by the currents, yet on the morrow, at daybreak, we had not advanced nearer than within five leagues of it. However, we kept on our course, and about ten o'clock we perceived a proa under sail to the southward between Tinian and Aguigan. As we imagined from hence that these islands were inhabited, and knew that the Spaniards had always a force at Guam, we took the necessary precautions for our own security: and endeavoured to prevent the enemy as much as possible from making an advantage of our present wretched circumstances, of which we feared they would be sufficiently informed by the manner of our working the ship. We therefore mustered all our hands who were capable of standing to their arms, and loaded our upper and quarter-deck guns with grape shot; and that we might the more readily procure some intelligence of the state of these islands, we showed Spanish colours, and hoisted a red flag at the fore top-mast-head, hoping thereby to give our ship the appearance of the Manila galeon, and to decoy some of the inhabitants on board us. Thus preparing ourselves, and standing towards the land, we were near enough, at three in the afternoon, to send the cutter on shore to find out a proper birth for the ship; and we soon perceived that a proa put off from the island to meet the cutter, fully persuaded, as we afterwards found, that we were the Manila ship. As we saw the cutter returning with the proa in tow, we instantly sent the pinnace to receive the proa and the prisoners, and to bring them on board, that the cutter might proceed on her errand. The pinnace came back with a Spaniard and four Indians, which were the people taken in the proa: and the Spaniard being immediately examined as to the produce and circumstances of this island of Tinian, his account of it surpassed even our most sanguine hopes. For he informed us that though it was uninhabited (which in itself, considering our present defenceless condition, was a convenience not to be despised), yet it wanted but few of the accommodations that could be expected in the most cultivated country. In particular, he assured us that there was plenty of very good water; that there were an incredible number of cattle, hogs, and poultry running wild on the island, all of them excellent in their kind; that the woods afforded sweet and sour oranges, limes, lemons, and coconuts in great abundance, besides a fruit peculiar to these islands, which served instead of bread; that from the quantity and goodness of the provisions produced here, the Spaniards at Guam made use of it as a store for supplying the garrison; and that he himself was a serjeant of that garrison, who was sent hither with twenty-two Indians to jerk beef, which he was to load for Guam on board a small bark of about fifteen tun, which lay at anchor near the shore.

This relation was received by us with inexpressible joy. Part of it we were ourselves able to verify on the spot, as we were by this time near enough to discover several numerous herds of cattle feeding in different places of the island; and we did not any ways doubt the rest of his narration, since the appearance of the shore prejudiced us greatly in its favour, and made us hope that not only our necessities might be there fully relieved, and our diseased recovered, but that, amidst those pleasing scenes which were then in view, we might procure ourselves some amusement and relaxation, after the numerous fatigues we had undergone. For the prospect of the country did by no means resemble that of an uninhabited and uncultivated place; but had much more the air of a magnificent plantation where large lawns and stately woods had been laid out together with great skill, and where the whole had been so artfully combined, and so judiciously adapted to the slopes of the hills, and the inequalities of the ground, as to produce a most striking effect, and to do honour to the invention of the contriver. Thus (an event not unlike what we had already seen) we were forced upon the most desirable and salutary measures by accidents which at first sight we considered as the greatest of misfortunes; for had we not been driven by the contrary winds and currents to the northward of our course (a circumstance which at that time gave us the most terrible apprehensions), we should, in all probability, never have arrived at this delightful island, and consequently we should have missed of that place where alone all our wants could be most amply relieved, our sick recovered, and our enfeebled crew once more refreshed, and enabled to put again to sea.

The Spanish serjeant, from whom we received the account of the island, having informed us that there were some Indians on shore under his command, employed in jerking beef, and that there was a bark at anchor to take it on board, we were desirous, if possible, to prevent the Indians from escaping, since they would certainly have given the Governor of Guam intelligence of our arrival: we therefore immediately dispatched the pinnace to secure the bark, as the serjeant told us that was the only embarkation on the place; and then about eight in the evening we let go our anchor in twenty-two fathom. But though it was almost calm, and whatever vigour and spirit was to be found on board was doubtless exerted to the utmost on this pleasing occasion, when, after having kept the sea for some months, we were going to take possession of this little paradise, yet we were full five hours in furling our sails. It is true we were somewhat weakened by the crews of the cutter and pinnace which were sent on shore; but it is not less true that, including those absent with the boats and some negroes and Indians prisoners, all the hands we could muster capable of standing at a gun amounted to no more than seventy-one, most of which too were incapable of duty except on the greatest emergencies. This, inconsiderable as it may appear, was the whole force we could collect in our present enfeebled condition from the united crews of the Centurion, the Gloucester, and the Tryal, which, when we departed from England, consisted all together of near a thousand hands.

When we had furled our sails, our people were allowed to repose themselves during the remainder of the night, to recover them from the fatigue they had undergone. But in the morning a party was sent on shore well armed, of which I myself was one, to make ourselves masters of the landing-place, since we were not certain what opposition might be made by the Indians on the island. We landed, however, without difficulty, for the Indians having perceived, by our seizure of the bark the night before, that we were enemies, they immediately fled into the woody parts of the island. We found on shore many huts which they had inhabited, and which saved us both the time and trouble of erecting tents. One of these huts, which the Indians made use offer a store-house, was very large, being twenty yards long and fifteen broad: this we immediately cleared of some bales of jerked beef which had been left in it, and converted it into an hospital for our sick, who as soon as the place was ready to receive them, were brought on shore, being in all a hundred and twenty-eight. Numbers of these were so very helpless that we were obliged to carry them from the boats to the hospital upon our shoulders, in which humane employment (as before at Juan Fernandes) the commodore himself, and every one of his officers, were engaged without distinction; and notwithstanding the extreme debility and the dying aspects of the greatest part of our sick, it is almost incredible how soon they began to feel the salutary influence of the land: for, though we buried twenty-one men on this and the preceding day, yet we did not lose above ten men more during the whole two months we staid here; but our diseased in general reaped so much benefit from the fruits of the island, particularly those of the acid kind, that in a week's time there were but few of them who were not so far recovered as to be able to move about without help.

Being now in some sort established at this place, we were enabled more distinctly to examine its qualities and productions; and that the reader may the better judge of our manner of life here, and future navigators be better apprized of the conveniencies we met with, I shall, before I proceed any farther in the history of our own adventures, throw together the most interesting particulars that came to our knowledge relating to the situation, soil, produce, and accommodations of this island of Tinian.

This island lies in the latitude of 15° 8' north, and longitude from Acapulco 114° 50' west. Its length is about twelve miles, and its breadth about half as much, it extending from the S.S.W. to N.N.E. The soil is everywhere dry and healthy, and being withal somewhat sandy, it is thereby the less disposed to a rank and over-luxuriant vegetation; and hence the meadows and the bottoms of the woods are much neater and smoother than is customary in hot climates. The land rose in gentle slopes from the very beach where we watered to the middle of the island, though the general course of its ascent was often interrupted by vallies of an easy descent, many of which wind irregularly through the country. These vallies and the gradual swellings of the ground which their different combinations gave rise to were most beautifully diversified by the mutual encroachments of woods and lawns, which coasted each other and traversed the island in large tracts. The woods consisted of tall and well-spread trees, the greatest part of them celebrated either for their aspect or their fruit: whilst the lawns were usually of a considerable breadth, their turf quite clean and uniform, it being composed of a very fine trefoil, which was intermixed with a variety of flowers. The woods too were in many places open, and free from all bushes and underwood, so that they terminated on the lawns with a well-defined outline, where neither shrubs nor weeds were to be seen; but the neatness of the adjacent turf was frequently extended to a considerable distance under the hollow shade formed by the trees. Hence arose a great number of the most elegant and entertaining prospects, according to the different blendings of these woods and lawns, and their various intersections with each other, as they spread themselves differently through the vallies, and over the slopes and declivities in which the place abounded. Nor were the allurements of Tinian confined to the excellency of its landskips only; since the fortunate animals, which during the greatest part of the year are the sole lords of this happy soil, partake in some measure of the romantic cast of the island, and are no small addition to its wonderful scenery; for the cattle, of which it is not uncommon to see herds of some thousands feeding together in a large meadow, are certainly the most remarkable in the world, as they are all of them milk-white, except their ears, which are generally brown or black. And though there are no inhabitants here, yet the clamour and frequent parading of domestic poultry, which range the woods in great numbers, perpetually excite the idea of the neighbourhood of farms and villages, and greatly contribute to the chearfulness and beauty of the place. The cattle on Tinian we computed were at least ten thousand; we had no difficulty in getting near them, for they were not at all shy of us. Our first method of killing them was shooting them; but at last, when by accidents to be hereafter recited we were obliged to husband our ammunition, our men ran them down with ease. Their flesh was extremely well tasted, and was believed by us to be much more easily digested than any we had ever met with. The fowls too were exceeding good, and were likewise run down with little trouble; for they could scarce fly further than an hundred yards at a flight, and even that fatigued them to such a degree that they could not readily rise again, so that, aided by the openness of the woods, we could at all times furnish ourselves with whatever number we wanted. Besides the cattle and the poultry we found here abundance of wild hogs. These were most excellent food, but as they were a very fierce animal, we were obliged either to shoot them, or to hunt them with large dogs, which we found upon the place at our landing, and which belonged to the detachment which was then upon the island amassing provisions for the garrison of Guam. As these dogs had been purposely trained to the killing of the wild hogs, they followed us very readily and hunted for us; but though they were a large bold breed, the hogs fought with so much fury that they frequently destroyed them, whence we by degrees lost the greatest part of them.

This place was not only extremely grateful to us, from the plenty and excellency of its fresh provisions, but was as much perhaps to be admired on account of its fruits and vegetable productions, which were most fortunately adapted to the cure of the sea scurvy, the disease which had so terribly reduced us. For in the woods there were inconceivable quantities of coco-nuts, with the cabbages growing on the same tree. There were besides, guavoes, limes, sweet and sour oranges, and a kind of fruit peculiar to these islands, called by the Indians Rhymay, but by us the Bread Fruit, for it was constantly eaten by us during our stay upon the island instead of bread, and so universally preferred to it that no ship's bread was expended in that whole interval. It grew upon a tree which is somewhat lofty, and which towards the top divides into large and spreading branches. The leaves of this tree are of a remarkable deep green, are notched about the edges, and are generally from a foot to eighteen inches in length. The fruit itself is found indifferently on all parts of the branches; it is in shape rather elliptical than round; it is covered with a rough rind, and is usually seven or eight inches long; each of them grows singly and not in clusters. This fruit is fittest to be used when it is full grown but still green, in which state, after it is properly prepared by being roasted in the embers, its taste has some distant resemblance to that of an artichoke's bottom, and its texture is not very different, for it is soft and spongy. As it ripens it becomes softer and of a yellow colour, when it contracts a luscious taste and an agreeable smell, not unlike a ripe peach; but then it is esteemed unwholsome and is said to produce fluxes. I shall only add that it is described both by Dampier and in Ray's History of Plants. Besides the fruits already enumerated, there were many other vegetables extremely conducive to the cure of the malady we had long laboured under, such as water melons, dandelion, creeping purslan, mint, scurvy grass, and sorrel; all which, together with the fresh meats of the place, we devoured with great eagerness, prompted thereto by the strong inclination which, in scorbutic disorders, nature never fails of exciting for those powerful specifics.

It will easily be conceived from what hath been already said that our chear upon this island was in some degree luxurious; but I have not yet recited all the varieties of provision which we here indulged in. Indeed we thought it prudent totally to abstain from fish, the few we caught at our first arrival having surfeited those who eat of them; but considering how much we had been inured to that species of food we did not regard this circumstance as a disadvantage, especially as the defect was so amply supplied by the beef, pork, and fowls already mentioned, and by great plenty of wild fowl; for it is to be remembered that near the centre of the island there were two considerable pieces of fresh water, which abounded with duck, teal, and curlew; not to mention the whistling plover, which we found there in prodigious plenty.

It may now perhaps be wondered at that an island so exquisitely furnished with the conveniencies of life, and so well adapted not only to the subsistence but likewise to the enjoyment of mankind, should be entirely destitute of inhabitants, especially as it is in the neighbourhood of other islands, which in some measure depend upon this for their support. To obviate this difficulty, I must observe that it is not fifty years since the island was depopulated. The Indians we had in our custody assured us that formerly the three islands of Tinian, Rota, and Guam were all full of inhabitants; and that Tinian alone contained thirty thousand souls: but a sickness raging amongst these islands which destroyed multitudes of the people, the Spaniards, to recruit their numbers at Guam, which were extremely diminished by the mortality, ordered all the inhabitants of Tinian thither; where, languishing for their former habitations and their customary method of life, the greatest part of them in a few years died of grief. Indeed, independent of that attachment which all mankind have ever shown to the places of their birth and bringing up, it should seem from what has been already said that there were few countries more worthy to be regretted than this of Tinian.

These poor Indians might reasonably have expected, at the great distance from Spain where they were placed, to have escaped the violence and cruelty of that haughty nation, so fatal to a large proportion of the whole human race: but it seems their remote situation could not protect them from sharing in the common destruction of the western world; all the advantage they received from their distance being only to perish an age or two later. It may perhaps be doubted if the number of the inhabitants of Tinian, who were banished to Guam, and who died there pining for their native home, was so considerable as what we have related above; but not to mention the concurrent assertion of our prisoners and the commodiousness of the island and its great fertility, there are still remains to be met with on the place which show it to have been once extremely populous. For there are in all parts of the island many ruins of a very particular kind. These usually consist of two rows of square pyramidal pillars, each pillar being about six feet from the next, and the distance between the rows being about twelve feet; the pillars themselves are about five feet square at the base, and about thirteen feet high; and on the top of each of them there is a semi-globe with the flat surface upwards; the whole of the pillars and semi-globe is solid, being composed of sand and stone cemented together and plaistered over. If the account our prisoners gave us of these structures was true, the island must indeed have been most extraordinary well peopled; since they assured us that they were the foundations of particular buildings set apart for those Indians only who had engaged in some religious vow; monastic institutions being often to be met with in many Pagan nations. However, if these ruins were originally the basis of the common dwelling-houses of the natives, their numbers must have been considerable; for in many parts of the island they are extremely thick planted, and sufficiently evince the great plenty of its former inhabitants. But to return to the present state of the island.

Having briefly recounted the conveniencies of this place, the excellency and quantity of its fruits and provisions, the neatness of its lawns, the stateliness, freshness, and fragrance of its woods, the happy inequality of its surface, and the variety and elegance of the views it afforded, I must now observe that all these advantages were greatly enhanced by the healthiness of its climate, by the almost constant breezes which prevail there, and by the frequent showers which fell there; for these, instead of the heavy continued rains which in some countries render great part of the year so unpleasing, were usually of a very short and almost momentary duration. Hence they were extremely grateful and refreshing, and were perhaps one cause of the salubrity of the air, and of the extraordinary influence it was observed to have upon us in increasing and invigorating our appetites and digestion. This effect was indeed remarkable, since those amongst our officers who were at all other times spare and temperate eaters, who, besides a slight breakfast, used to make but one moderate repast a day, were here, in appearance, transformed into gluttons; for instead of one reasonable flesh meal, they were now scarcely satisfied with three, each of them too so prodigious in quantity as would at another time have produced a fever or a surfeit. And yet our digestion so well corresponded to the keenness of our appetites that we were neither disordered nor even loaded by this uncommon repletion; for after having, according to the custom of the island, made a large beef breakfast, it was not long before we began to consider the approach of dinner as a very desirable, though somewhat tardy, incident.

After giving these large encomiums to this island, in which, however, I conceive I have not done it justice, it is necessary I should speak of those circumstances in which it is defective, whether in point of beauty or utility. And, first, with respect to its water. I must own that, before I had seen this spot, I did not conceive that the absence of running water, of which it is entirely destitute, could have been so well replaced by any other means as it is in this island; since though there are no streams, yet the water of the wells and springs, which are to be met with everywhere near the surface, is extremely good; and in the midst of the island there are two or three considerable pieces of excellent water, the turf of whose banks was as clean, as even, and as regularly disposed as if they had been basons purposely made for the decoration of the place. It must, however, be confessed that with regard to the beauty of the prospects, the want of rills and streams is a very great defect, not to be compensated either by large pieces of standing water or by the neighbourhood of the sea, though that, from the smallness of the island generally, makes a part of every extensive landskip.

As to the residence upon the island, the principal inconvenience attending it is the vast numbers of muscatos, and various other species of flies, together with an insect called a tick; this, though principally attached to the cattle, would yet frequently fasten upon our limbs and bodies, and if not perceived and removed in time would bury its head under the skin and raise a painful inflammation. We found here too centipedes and scorpions, which we supposed were venomous, though none of us ever received any injury from them.

But the most important and formidable exception to this place remains still to be told. This is the inconvenience of the road and the little security there is in some seasons for a ship at anchor. The only proper anchoring place for ships of burthen is at the S.W. end of the island. Here the Centurion anchored in twenty and twenty-two fathom water about a mile and an half distant from the shore opposite to a sandy bay. The bottom of this road is full of sharp-pointed coral rocks, which, during four months of the year, that is from the middle of June to the middle of October, render it a very unsafe anchorage. This is the season of the western monsoons, when near the full and change of the moon, but more particularly at the change, the wind is usually variable all round the compass, and seldom fails to blow with such fury that the stoutest cables are not to be confided in. What adds to the danger at these times is the excessive rapidity of the tide of flood which sets to the S.E. between this island and that of Aguiguan, a small islet near the southern extremity of Tinian. This tide runs at first with a vast head and overfall of water, occasioning such a hollow and overgrown sea as is scarcely to be conceived; so that (as will be more particularly recited in the sequel) we were under the dreadful apprehensions of being pooped by it, though we were in a sixty-gun ship. In the remaining eight months of the year, that is from the middle of October to the middle of June, there is a constant season of settled weather, when, if the cables are but well armed, there is scarcely any danger of their being even rubbed, so that during all that interval it is as secure a road as could be wished for. I shall only add that the anchoring bank is very shelving, and stretches along the S.W. end of the island, and is entirely free from shoals, except a reef of rocks which is visible, and lies about half a mile from the shore, affording a narrow passage into a small sandy bay, which is the only place where boats can possibly land. Having given this account of the island and its produce, it is necessary to return to our own history.

Our first undertaking after our arrival was the removal of our sick on shore, as hath been related. Whilst we were thus employed, four of the Indians on the island, being part of the Spanish Serjeant's detachment, came and surrendered themselves to us, so that with those we took in the proa, we had now eight of them in our custody. One of the four who submitted undertook to show us the most convenient places for killing cattle, and two of our men were ordered to attend him on that service; but one of them unwarily trusting the Indian with his firelock and pistol, the Indian escaped with them into the woods. His countrymen, who remained behind, were apprehensive of suffering for this perfidy of their comrade, and therefore begged leave to send one of their own party into the country, who they engaged should both bring back the arms and persuade the whole detachment from Guam to submit to us. The commodore granted their request, and one of them was dispatched on this errand, who returned next day and brought back the firelock and pistol, but assured us he had found them in a pathway in the wood, and protested that he had not been able to meet with any one of his countrymen. This report had so little the air of truth that we suspected there was some treachery carrying on, and therefore to prevent any future communication amongst them, we immediately ordered all the Indians who were in our power on board the ship, and did not permit them to go any more on shore.

When our sick were well settled on the island, we employed all the hands that could be spared from attending them in arming the cables with a good rounding, several fathom from the anchor, to secure them from being rubbed by the coral rocks which here abounded. This being compleated, our next occupation was our leak, and in order to raise it out of water, we, on the first of September, began to get the guns aft to bring the ship by the stern; and now the carpenters, being able to come at it on the outside, they ripped off what was left of the old sheathing, caulked all the seams on both sides the cut-water, and leaded them over, and then new sheathed the bows to the surface of the water. By this means we conceived the defect was sufficiently secured, but upon our beginning to return the guns to their ports, we had the mortification to perceive that the water rushed into the ship in the old place with as much violence as ever. Hereupon we were necessitated to begin again, and that our second attempt might be more successful, we cleared the fore store-room and sent a hundred and thirty barrels of powder on board the small Spanish bark we had seized here, by which means we raised the ship about three feet out of the water forwards. The carpenters now ripped off the sheathing lower down, new caulked all the seams, and afterwards laid on new sheathing; and then, supposing the leak to be effectually stopped, we began to move the guns forwards; but the upper deck guns were scarcely replaced when, to our amazement, it burst out again. As we durst not cut away the lining within board, lest a but end or a plank might start, and we might go down immediately, we had no other resource left than chincing and caulking within board. Indeed by this means the leak was stopped for some time; but when our guns were all fixed in their ports, and our stores were taken on board, the water again forced its way through a hole in the stem where one of the bolts was driven in. We on this desisted from all farther efforts, being at last well assured that the defect was in the stem itself, and that it was not to be remedied till we should have an opportunity of heaving down.

In the first part of the month of September, several of our sick were tolerably recovered by their residence on shore; and on the 12th of September all those who were so far relieved since their arrival as to be capable of doing duty were sent on board the ship: and then the commodore, who was himself ill of the scurvy, had a tent erected for him on shore, where he went with the view of staying a few days to establish his health, being convinced by the general experience of his people that no other method but living on the land was to be trusted to for the removal of this dreadful malady. The place where his tent was pitched on this occasion was near the well whence we got all our water, and was indeed a most elegant spot.

As the crew on board were now reinforced by the recovered hands returned from the island, we began to send our casks on shore to be fitted up, which till this time could not be done, for the coopers were not well enough to work. We likewise weighed our anchors, that we might examine our cables, which we suspected had by this time received considerable damage. And as the new moon was now approaching, when we apprehended violent gales, the commodore, for our greater security, ordered that part of the cables next to the anchors to be armed with the chains of the fire-grapnels; besides which, they were cackled twenty fathom from the anchors and seven fathom from the service with a good rounding of a 4-½-inch hauser; and being persuaded that the dangers of this road demanded our utmost foresight, we to all these precautions added that of lowering the main and fore-yard close down, that in case of blowing weather the wind might have less power upon the ship to make her ride a strain.