Upon this, they made to the first rising ground they could come at, and there they encamped, and at night fired some rockets, and after the third rocket was fired, they, to their great joy, saw two rockets rise up from the westward, and soon after that a third; and in two days more they all joyfully met.
We had been here, as I have said, impatiently expecting them a great while; but, at last, the man at the main-top, who was ordered to look out, called aloud to us below, that he saw a flash of fire; and immediately, the men looking to landward, they saw two rockets rise up in the air at a great distance, which we answered by firing three rockets again, and they returned by one rocket, to signify that they saw our men's signal.
This was a joyful exchange of distant language to both sides; but I was not there, for, being impatient, I had put out and sailed about ten leagues farther; but our ship fired three guns to give me notice, which, however, we heard not, and yet we knew they fired too; for, it being in the night, our men, who were very attentive with their eyes, as well as ears, saw plainly the three flashes of the guns, though they could not hear the report, the wind being contrary.
This was such certain intelligence to me, and I was so impatient to know how things went, that, having also a small gale of wind, I weighed immediately, and stood back again to our other ship; it was not, however, till the second day after we weighed that we came up to them, having little or no wind all the first day; the next day in the morning they spied us, and fired the three guns again, being the signal that they had got news of our friends.
Nothing could be more to my satisfaction than to hear that they had got news, and it was as much to their satisfaction as to ours to be sure, I mean our little army; for if any disaster had happened to us, they had been in a very odd condition; and though they might have found means to subsist, yet they would have been out of all hope of ever returning to their own country.
Upon the signal I stood into the bay, and came to an anchor at about a league to the northward of our other ship, and as far from the shore, and, as it were, in the mouth of the river, waiting for another signal from our men, by which, we might judge which side of the river to go ashore at, and might take some proper measures to come at them.
About five o'clock in the evening, our eyes being all up in the air, and towards the hills, for the appointed signals, beheld, to our great surprise, a canoe come rowing to us out of the mouth of the river. Immediately we went to work with our perspective glasses; one said it was one thing, and one said it was another, until I fetched a large telescope out of the cabin, and with that I could easily see they were my own men, and it was to our inexpressible satisfaction that they soon after came directly on board.
It might very well take up another volume to give a farther account of the particulars of their journey, or, rather, their journey and voyage.
How they got through the hills, and were entertained by the generous Spaniard, and afterwards by the wealthy Chilian; how the men, greedy for gold, were hardly brought away from the mountains; and how, once, they had much ado to persuade them not to rob the honest Chilian who had used them so well, till my lieutenant, then their captain, by a stratagem, seized on their weapons, and threatened to speak to the Spaniard to raise the Chilians in the mountains, and have all their throats cut; and yet even this did not suffice, till the two midshipmen, then their lieutenants, assured them that at the first opening of the hills, and in the rivers beyond, they would have plenty of gold; and one of the midshipmen told them, that if he did not see them have so much gold that they would not stoop to take up any more, they should have all his share to be divided among them, and should leave him behind in the first desolate place they could find.
How this appeased them till they came to the outer edge of the mountains, where I had been, and where my patron, the Spaniard, left them, having supplied them with sixteen mules to carry their baggage, and some guinacoes, or sheep of Peru, which would carry burdens, and afterwards be good to eat also.