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 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 any 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