In three or four days after, we arrived at our old station, Wager's Island, but in such a miserable plight, that though we thought our condition upon setting out would not admit of any additional circumstance of misery, yet it was to be envied in comparison of what we now suffered, so worn and reduced were we by fatigue and hunger, having eat nothing for some days but sea-weed and tangle. Upon this expedition, we had been out, by our account, just two months; in which we had rounded, backwards and forwards, the great bay formed to the northward by that high land we had observed from Mount Misery.
The first thing we did upon our arrival was to secure the barge, as this was our sole dependence for any relief that might offer by sea; which done, we repaired to our huts, which formed a kind of village or street, consisting of several irregular habitations, some of which being covered by a kind of brush-wood thatch, afforded tolerable shelter against the inclemency of the weather. Among these, there was one which we observed with some surprise to be nailed up. We broke it open, and found some iron- work, picked out with much pains from those pieces of the wreck which, were driven ashore. We concluded from hence, that the Indians who had been here in our absence were not of that tribe with which we had some commerce before, who seemed to set no value upon iron, but from some other quarter; and must have had communication with the Spaniards, from whom they had learned the value and use of that commodity.
Thieving from strangers is a commendable talent among savages in general, and bespeaks an address which they much admire; though the strictest honesty with regard to the property of each other is observed among them. There is no doubt but they ransacked all our houses, but the men had taken care before they went off in the long-boat to strip them of their most valuable furniture, that is, the bales of cloth used for lining, and converted them into trowsers and watch-coats. Upon farther search, we found, thrown aside in the bushes at the back of one of the huts, some pieces of seal in a very putrid condition, which, however, our stomachs were far from loathing. The next business which the people set about very seriously, was to proceed to Mount Misery, and bury the corpse of the murdered person mentioned to have been discovered there some little time after our being cast away; for to the neglect of this necessary tribute to that unfortunate person the men assigned all their ill success upon the late expedition.
That common people in general are addicted to superstitious conceits, is an observation founded on experience, and the reason is evident; but I cannot allow that common seamen are more so than others of the lower class. In the most enlightened ages of antiquity, we find it to have been the popular opinion, that the spirits of the dead were not at rest till their bodies were interred; and that they did not cease to haunt and trouble those who had neglected this duty to the departed. This is still believed by the vulgar in most countries; and in our men this persuasion was much heightened by the melancholy condition they were reduced to, and was farther confirmed by an occurrence which happened some little time before we went upon our last expedition. One night we were alarmed with a strange cry, which resembled that of a man drowning. Many of us ran out of our huts towards the place from whence the noise proceeded, which was not far off shore, where we could perceive, but not distinctly, (for it was then moonlight) an appearance like that of a man swimming half out of water. The noise that this creature uttered was so unlike that of any animal they had heard before, that it made a great impression upon the men; and they frequently recalled this apparition at the time of their distresses, with reflections on the neglect of the office they were now fulfilling.
We were soon driven again to the greatest straits for want of something to subsist upon, by the extreme bad weather that now set in upon us. Wild sellery was all we could procure, which raked our stomachs instead of assuaging our hunger. That dreadful and last resource of men, in not much worse circumstances than ours, of consigning one man to death for the support of the rest, began to be mentioned in whispers; and indeed there were some among as who, by eating what they found raw, were become little better than cannibals. But fortunately for us, and opportunely to prevent this horrid proceeding, Mr Hamilton at this time found some rotten pieces of beef cast up by the sea at some miles distance from the huts, which he, though a temptation which few would have resisted in parallel circumstances, scorned to conceal from the rest, but generously distributed among us.
A few days after, the mystery of the nailing up of the hut, and what had been doing by the Indians upon the island in our absence, was partly explained to us; for about the 15th day after our return, there came a party of Indians to the island in two canoes, who were not a little surprised to find us here again. Among these, was an Indian of the tribe of the Chonos, who live in the neighbourhood of Chiloe.[117] He talked the Spanish language, but with that savage accent which renders it almost unintelligible to any but those who are adepts in that language. He was likewise a cacique, or leading man of his tribe, which authority was confirmed to him by the Spaniards; for he carried the usual badge and mark of distinction by which the Spaniards and their dependants hold their military and civil employments, which is a stick with a silver head. These badges, of which the Indians are very vain, at once serve to retain the cacique in the strongest attachment to the Spanish government, and give him greater weight with his own dependants: yet, withal, he is the merest slave, and has not one thing he can call his own.
[117] Chiloe is an island on the western coast of America, situated in 42° 40 of S. latitude, and the southernmost settlement under the Spanish jurisdiction on that coast.
This report of our shipwreck (as we supposed) having reached the Chonos, by means of the intermediate tribes, which handed it to one another from those Indians who first visited us, this cacique was either sent to learn the truth of the rumour, or, having first got the intelligence, set out with a view of making some advantage of the wreck, and appropriating such iron- work as he could gather from it to his own use; for that metal is become very valuable to those savages, since their commerce with the Spaniards has taught them to apply it to several purposes. But as the secreting any thing from a rapacious Spanish rey or governor (even an old rusty nail) by any of their Indian dependants, is a very dangerous offence, he was careful to conceal the little prize he had made till he could conveniently carry it away; for in order to make friends of these savages, we had left their hoard untouched.
Our surgeon, Mr Elliot, being master of a few Spanish words, made himself so far understood by the cacique, as to let him know that our intention was to reach some of the Spanish settlements if we could; that we were unacquainted with the best and safest way, and what track was most likely to afford us subsistence in our journey; promising, if he would undertake to conduct us in the barge, he should have it and every thing in it for his trouble as soon as it had served our present occasions. To these conditions the cacique, after much persuasion, at length agreed. Accordingly, having made the best preparation we could, we embarked on board the barge to the number of fifteen, including the cacique, whose name was Martin, and his servant Emanuel. We were, indeed, sixteen when we returned from our last fruitless attempt to get off the island, but we had buried two since that, who perished with hunger; and a marine, having committed theft, ran away to avoid the punishment his crime deserved, and hid himself in the woods, since which he was never heard of. We now put off, accompanied with the two Indian canoes, in one of which was a savage with his two wives, who had an air of dignity superior to the rest, and was handsome in his person. He had his hut, during his stay with us, separate from the other Indians, who seemed to pay him extraordinary respect; but in two or three nights, these Indians, being independent of the Spaniards, and living somewhere to the southward of our Chonos guide, left us to proceed on our journey by ourselves.
The first night we lay at an island destitute of all refreshment, where having found some shelter for our boat and made ourselves a fire, we slept by it. The next night we were more unfortunate, though our wants were increasing, for, having run to the westward of Montrose Island, we found no shelter for the barge, but were under the necessity of lying upon our oars, suffering the most extreme pangs of hunger. The next day brought us to the bottom of a great bay, where the Indian guide had left his family, a wife and two children, in a hut. Here we staid two or three days, during which we were constantly employed in ranging along shore in quest of shell-fish.