A General History & Collection of Voyages and Travels ... - Nauticus

which appears supernatural, and will scarcely find credit in this part of the world; for whowill believe that fish should fall from the sky in a shower of rain? A gentleman of veracity,who spent many years in the East Indies, declares to his friends that he has been witness tothis several times; but speaks of it with caution, knowing that it will be thought incredibleby those who are not acquainted with the cause. I have a servant, a native of the WestIndies, who assures me he was once a witness to this fact himself, when small fish, abouttwo or three inches long, fell in great numbers during a storm of rain. The spot where thishappened was in the island of Jamaica, within about a mile of the sea. When water iscarried with violence from the sea up the column of a spout, small fish, which are too weakto escape when the column is forming, are conveyed up to the clouds, and fall from themafterwards on land, not far distant from the sea." He had before related an instance of onethat passed over the town of Hatfield, in Yorkshire, filling the air with the thatch it pluckedoff from the houses, and rolling strangely together several sheets of lead on the corner ofthe church.--E.In coming from Cape Farewell to Cape Stephens, I had a better view of the coast than I had when Ipassed in my former voyage, and observed that about six leagues to the east of the first-mentionedcape, is a spacious bay, which is covered from the sea by a low point of land. This is, I believe, thesame that Captain Tasman anchored in on the 18th of December, 1642, and by him calledMurderer's Bay, by reason of some of his men being killed by the natives. Blind Bay, so named byme in my former voyage, lies to the S.E. of this, and seems to run a long way inland to the south; thesight, in this direction, not being bounded by any land. The wind having returned to the west, asalready mentioned, we resumed our course to the east; and at day-light the next morning (being the18th,) we appeared off Queen Charlotte's Sound, where we discovered our consort the Adventure, bythe signals she made to us; an event which every one felt with an agreeable satisfaction. The freshwesterly wind now died away, and was succeeded by light airs from the S. and S.W., so that we hadto work in with our boats a-head towing. In the doing of this we discovered a rock, which we did notsee in my former voyage. It lies in the direction of S. by E. 1/2 E., distant four miles from theoutermost of the Two Brothers, and in a line with the White Rocks, on with the middle of LongIsland. It is just even with the surface of the sea, and hath deep water all round it. At noon,Lieutenant Kemp of the Adventure came on board; from whom I learnt that their ship had been hereabout six weeks. With the assistance of a light breeze, our boats, and the tides, we at six o'clock inthe evening, got to an anchor in Ship Cove, near the Adventure, when Captain Furneaux came onboard, and gave me the following account of his proceedings, from the time we parted to my arrivalhere.SECTION VII.Captain Furneaux's Narrative, from the Time the two Ships were separated, to their joining again inQueen Charlotte's Sound, with some Account of Van Diemen's Land.On the 7th of February, 1773, in the morning, the Resolution being then about two miles a-head, thewind shifting then to the westward, brought on a very thick fog; so that we lost sight of her. We soonafter heard a gun, the report of which we imagined to be on the larboard beam; we then hauled up S.E., and kept firing a four-pounder every half hour, but had no answer, nor further sight of her; thenwe kept the course we steered on before the fog came on. In the evening it began to blow hard, andwas at intervals more clear, but could see nothing of her, which gave us much uneasiness. We thentacked and stood to the westward, to cruise in the place where we last saw her, according toagreement, in case of separation; but next day came on a very heavy gale of wind and thick weather,that obliged us to bring to, and thereby prevented us reaching the intended spot. However, the windcoming more moderate, and the fog in some measure clearing away, we cruised as near the place aswe could get, for three days; when giving over all hopes of joining company again, we bore away forwinter quarters, distant fourteen hundred leagues, through a sea entirely unknown and reduced theallowance of water to one quart per day.