The 29th of May, Candish went to an island near Puna, into which the caçique had conveyed all the valuable furniture of his palace, with other things of value. These stores were all discovered, and plundered of every thing thought worth carrying on board the ships, and the rest destroyed. The church also of Puna, which stood near the palace, was burnt down, and its five bells carried to the ships. On the 2d June, the English were attacked by 100 Spaniards, who killed or took prisoners twelve of their men, losing forty-six of their own in the encounter. Candish landed again that same day with seventy English, and had another battle with the Spaniards, who were joined by 200 Indians armed with bows and arrows. The English were victorious, after which they made great havock of the fields and orchards, burnt four ships on the stocks, and left the town of 300 houses a heap of rubbish. Besides this principal town, there were two others on the island of 200 houses each, so that Puna was the best settled island on all this coast.
Setting sail from Puna on the 5th June, they sailed to Rio Dolce, where they watered. They passed the equinoctial on the 12th, continuing their course northwards all the rest of that month. The 1st July, they had sight of New Spain, being four leagues from the land in 10° N. The 9th they took a new ship of 120 tons, in which was one Michael Sancius, a native of Provence, a very skilful coasting pilot for these seas, whom Candish retained as his pilot, and from whom he got the first hint of the great ship Anna Maria, which he afterwards took on her voyage from the Philippine islands. Taking all the men, and every thing of any value from the ship of Sancius, they set her on fire. The 26th they came to anchor in the mouth of the river Capalico, and the same night went in the pinnace with thirty men to Guatalco, two leagues from that river, in 15° 70' N. and burnt both the town and custom-house, which was a large handsome building, in which there were laid up 600 bags of indigo, and 400 bags of cacao, every bag of the former being worth forty crowns, and each of the latter worth ten. These cacaos serve among the people of these parts both as food and money, being somewhat like almonds, yet not quite so pleasant, and pass in trade by way of small change, 150 of them being equal in value to a rial of plate.
They set sail from Capalico on the 28th, the sea running so high that they could not fill their water casks, and came to Guatalco that same night. Next day Candish went ashore with thirty men, marching two miles into the woods, where he took a mestizo belonging to the custom-house of that town, having with him a considerable quantity of goods, both which and their master were carried to the ships. The 24th August, Candish went with thirty men in the pinnace to the haven of Puerto de Navidad in lat. 19° 24' N. where Sancius had informed him there would be a prize; but, before their arrival, she had gone twelve leagues farther to fish for pearls. They here made prisoner of a mulatto, who had been sent to give notice of the English, all along the coast of New Gallicia, and got possession of all his letters. They likewise burnt the town, and two ships of 200 tons here building, after which they returned to the ships.
They came on the 26th into the bay of St Jago, where they watered at a good river, which yielded them plenty of fish, and where they found some pearls. This bay is in lat. 19° 18' N. Leaving this bay on the 2d September, they came next day into the bay of Malacca, a league westward from port Navidad, and a good place for ships to ride in. That day, Candish went ashore with about thirty men, to an Indian town named Acatlan, about two leagues from the road.[52] This town or village consisted of twenty or thirty houses and a church, which they demolished, and then returned at night to the ships. Leaving this bay on the 4th, they came on the 8th to the road of Chacalla, eighteen leagues from Cape Corientes. On the 9th, Candish sent a party of forty men, guided by Sancius, which, after marching through woods and deserts, lighted upon a few families, some of which were Indians, and others Spanish and Portuguese, all of whom were brought to the ships. The women were ordered to fetch plantains, lemons, oranges, and other fruits, in reward for which all their husbands were set free, except a Spaniard named Sembrano, and Diego, a Portuguese.
[Footnote 52: Guatlan is the name of a bay on this coast, and which is probably corrupted in the text to Acatlan.--E.]
On the 12th they arrived at the island of St Andrew, which is very full of wood, and where they found plenty of fowls and seals, together with a sort of serpents, or lizards rather, called Iguanos, having four feet and a long sharp tail, which they found good eating. Leaving this isle, they came to the road of Mazatlan on the 24th, lying under the tropic of Cancer. The river here is large within, but much obstructed by a bar at its mouth. The bay abounds with fish, and there are abundance of good fruits up the country. Departing from this bay on the 27th, they came to an island, a league north from Mazatlan,[53] where they heeled their ships, and rebuilt their pinnace. On this isle, they found fresh water, by digging two or three feet into the sand, otherwise they must have gone back twenty or thirty leagues for water, being advised by one Flores, a Spanish prisoner, to dig in the sands, where no water or sign of any could be perceived. Having amply supplied the ships with water, they remained at this island till the 9th October, and then sailed from Cape San Lucar, the S.W. point of California, in lat. 22° 50' N. which they fell in with on the 14th, observing that it much resembled the Needles at the Isle of Wight, which had been before noticed by Sir Francis Drake. Within this cape, there is a large bay, called by the Spaniards Aguada Segura,[54] into which falls a fine fresh-water river, the banks of which are usually inhabited by many Indians in the summer. They went into this bay, where they again watered, and remained waiting for the Accapulco ship till the 4th November, the wind continuing all that time to hang westerly.
[Footnote 53: In our best modern maps no such island is to be found; but about the same distance to the S. is a cluster of small isles.--E.]
[Footnote 54: Probably that now called the bay of St Barnaby, about twenty miles E.N.E. from Cape San Lucar.--E.]
The 4th November, putting to sea, the Desire and Content beat to and fro to windward off the head land of California; and that very morning one of the men in the admiral, going aloft to the topmast, espied a ship bearing in from seaward for the cape. Putting every thing in readiness for action, Candish gave chase, and coming up with her in the afternoon, gave her a broadside and a volley of small arms. This ship was the Santa Anna of 700 tons burden, belonging to the king of Spain, and commanded by the admiral of the South Sea. Candish instantly boarded, finding the Spaniards in a good posture of defence, and was repulsed with the loss of two men slain and four or five wounded. He then renewed the action with his cannon and musquetry, raking the St Ann, and killing or wounding great numbers, as she was full of men. The Spaniards long defended themselves manfully; but the ship being sore wounded, so that the water poured in a-main, they at last hung out a flag of truce, praying for quarter, and offering to surrender. This was immediately agreed to by Candish, who ordered them to lower their sails, and to send their chief officers to his ship. They accordingly hoisted out their boat, in which came the captain, the pilot, and one of the chief merchants, who surrendered themselves, and gave an account of the value of their ship, in which were 122,000 pezos in gold, with prodigious quantities of rich silks, satins, damasks, and divers kinds of merchandise, such as musk, and all manner of provisions, almost as acceptable to the English as riches, having been long at sea.
The prize thus gloriously obtained, Candish returned to Aguada, or Puerto Seguro, on the 6th November, where he landed all the Spaniards, to the number of 150 persons, men and women, giving them plenty of wine and victuals, with the sails of their ship and some planks, to build huts or tents for them to dwell in. The owners of the prize being thus disposed of, the next thing was to share the booty; which ungracious work of distribution soon involved Candish in all the troubles of a mutiny, every one being eager for gold, yet no one satisfied with his share. This disturbance was most violent in the Content; but all was soon appeased and compromised by the candid and generous behaviour of Candish. The 17th of November, being the coronation day of queen Elizabeth, was celebrated by discharges of ordnance, and vollies of small shot, and at night by fireworks. Of the prisoners taken in the Spanish ship, Candish reserved two Japanese boys, three natives of the island of Luzon or Manilla, a Portuguese who had been in China and Japan, and a Spanish pilot, who was thoroughly versant in the navigation between New Spain and the Philippine islands. Accapulco is the haven whence they fit out for the Philippines, and the Ladrones are their stated places of refreshment on this voyage.