Before we proceed further we will say a word concerning the island of Texel, where we were about eight days, although the island is well known. It is said to be twenty-eight miles[57] in circumference, and is nearly oval in form. The shore, inside along the Texelsdiep, is dyked; on the outside, along the North Sea, it is beset with dunes. There are six villages, namely Oosterend, Seelt, the Hoogh, the Burgh, which is the principal one, and has privileges like a city, such as that of inflicting capital punishment and others; the Oude Schilt, which is mostly resorted to by ships, the Hoorn, and also the West End, which has now fallen into decay. We saw four of them but not the Hoogh which lay out of the way, and the West End which had fallen into decay. Inland the country is rough, and some of it high, so that there are few ditches, except in the low lands for the most part on the side of Texelsdiep. Otherwise they protect their land with small dykes of earth. The soil is sandy, which affords very good water in the high places. The meadow lands are somewhat dry, but yield a fine grass. The inhabitants gain their livelihood, for the most part, by raising sheep and making Texel cheese. The sheep are smaller, but fatter and more hardy than they are in Friesland. They seldom bring forth two young at a birth, and when they do, one usually is killed in order that the other may be better nourished. The inhabitants have cows for their own use. The dyke is not high or thick, but is lined with wier, a kind of sea grass, which they put together and lay against the dyke somewhat higher than the earth work. Piles are driven outside to hold this wier against it, and prevent the sea from washing it away. This dyke is repaired every year by contract. Many fishermen and pilots live along it, both qualifications generally being in the same person, as well as the other pursuits pertaining to navigation. There are about five hundred pilots in all living on the island of Texel, as can be seen by the numbers which they carry on their sails or wings.
The law is that no ship can go in or out without a pilot; and in case any captain will not take a pilot, he is nevertheless bound to pay the fees of one, and in case the captain will not pay them, the pilots can go to Amsterdam and there obtain it at the expense of the captain. And if the captain take no pilot and an accident happen, the consequences fall upon him; but I believe this first rule only applies to ships belonging to Amsterdam or other ports in Holland; and that foreign ships are more free in that respect, but cannot relieve themselves from the second. The pilots who bring in ships from the outside bring them to the Texel roadstead or the Helder, and others take them to Amsterdam or elsewhere; and those who take them from Amsterdam, go no further than the Texel road or the Vlie,[58] and other pilots carry them out to sea. The fee of the pilots is a guilder[59] a foot for every foot the ship draws, though any sum may be fixed by agreement.
During the whole time we were there we saw few or no fish, though we supposed this was the place for fish. We remarked further that the inhabitants of Texel were more polite than the boors of Friesland. A large portion of them are Romanists. There was no home-brewed beer tapped in the taverns, but it was all foreign beer, and this I suppose was for the purpose of saving the excise. They are under the jurisdiction of West Friesland and the particular government of the city of Alckmaer,[60] whose weights and measures they use. West of the Oude Schilt there is a small fortification with four points and two redoubts on the dyke, and some small batteries; but they afford little protection to the place, and still less to the harbor. It was closed and without men, when we were there. When we first came there, the people, unaccustomed to see such persons, regarded us as some individuals in particular. The innkeepers took us to be farmers of the revenue, especially of brandies, and supposed our presence there was to prevent their smuggling, as they themselves told us. The Roman Catholics, as they declared, looked upon us as priests; the Mennonists, as a class of their exhorters; and the ordinary Reformed, as preachers; whereby they all showed they did not know us in truth, according to the word in Christ Jesus.
Leaving Texel and the land we came outside the coast, laying our course S.W. with a S.E. wind, with which we sailed some distance from the shore. Towards evening the wind began to blow from the S. and S.S.W. quite hard, and so we stood off through the whole night. I do not know that I ever had in my life so severe a pain in the breast as I had this evening, whether it was from hard work or change of our condition.
27th, Tuesday. The wind from the same quarter as before, but blowing harder, for which reason we reefed our topsails. We had twenty-six and twenty-eight fathoms of water. By evening it was somewhat calmer; but as the wind was not steady we stood off from the shore.
28th, Wednesday. Finding ourselves in twenty-five and twenty-six fathoms of water and the wind still south and southwest we sailed over by the wind. It continued to blow hard, and we sailed for the most part N. by E. and N.N.E. It annoyed me that I could not get at our chest, in order to obtain my charts and books of navigation. Our mate and others observed the latitude, and found it to be 52° 16´; and we tacked about. The wind continued in the same quarter, sometimes a little lighter, sometimes sharper. We kept mostly a S.S.E. course, with hard weather the first part of the night.
29th, Thursday. Having twenty-six and twenty-seven fathoms of water we lay over again. Every day there were many mackerel caught, which for several days were for the cabin only, whatever number were caught, because they were taken with the captain's hooks; but the passengers and sailors began to get their hooks ready also and thus every one began to catch and eat. The weather was delightful. I had obtained my things out of the chest, and found the latitude 52° 18´ [?]. We stood over to the Flemish or Zeelandish coast, calculating we were not far from Sluis and Bruges. I therefore went aloft frequently to look out for land. We saw several fishing boats, one of which we hailed toward evening. He was from Zierickzee, and told us Walcheren[61] was about twenty-eight miles E.S.E. of us, and we could see it from the mast head, as was the fact. We laid over again immediately. It now began to blow more from the S.W. and S.W. by W. We had sailed the last night west by north, according to reckoning, twenty-eight miles. This result agreed with my observation within less than four miles, and that of our mate, named Evert. But the captain's and the English mate's calculation brought us before the Maes, as Evert[62] told me.
We sailed now for a day or two among great quantities of June-bugs or cock-chafers, which had been driven off from the land and drowned,[63] which caused us to reflect upon what God did formerly in Egypt and elsewhere, and still often does, for His power is always the same, although it is not always understood.
30th, Friday. We tacked over to the Flemish coast this morning in twenty-five fathoms of water; but it was so calm that we made little progress. It was too cloudy to take the latitude. The wind was very variable, and we could not keep on S.W., or even south, and so drifted for the most part with the tide.
July 1st, Saturday. We had drifted the whole night in the calm, and had gone backwards instead of forwards; but in the morning the wind began to blow out of the N.W. and N.N.W. with a stiff breeze. We therefore set all sail, and went ahead tolerably well on a straight course W. by S. and W.S.W. against the current. We saw land many times about two hours' distance, both on the starboard and larboard, that on the starboard being the cape of Dover, and on the larboard, the cape of Calais. There was a free wind and fine weather, though a little haze on the horizon. The land began to loom up more distinctly, and I sketched it twice with crayon. We continued to catch plenty of mackerel, and also weevers and whitings. We arrived before Dover at sunset, when we fired a gun, and a boat came off to us immediately, by which the captain sent some letters ashore. We inquired of them the news, and they answered us all was well; but they told the captain privately that 30,000 Scottish Papists had taken up arms for the conspirators.[64]