[CHAPTER V.]
Navigation of the River.--One of our Men dies from Fatigue.--Inhumanity of the Captain.--Description of our Passage through a horrible and desolate Country.--Our Conductor leaves us, and a Party of our Men desert with the Boat.--Dreadful Situation of the Remainder.--The Cacique returns.--Account of our Journey Overland.--Kindness of two Indian Women.--Description of the Indian Mode of Fishing.--Cruel Treatment of my Indian Benefactress by her Husband.
We now again proceeded on our voyage, having received on board the family of our guide, who conducted us to a river, the stream of which was so rapid, that, after our almost efforts from morning to evening, we gained little upon the current, and at last were obliged to desist from our attempt, and return. I had hitherto steered the boat, but one of our men sinking under the fatigue, expired soon after, which obliged me to take the oar in his room, and row against this heart-breaking stream. Whilst I was thus employed, one of our men, whose name was John Bosman, though hitherto the stoutest man among us, fell from his seat under the thwarts, complaining that his strength was quite exhausted for want of food, and that he should die very shortly. As he lay in this condition, he would every now and then break out in the most pathetic wishes for some little sustenance, that two or three monthfuls might be the means of saving his life. The captain at this time had a large piece of boiled seal by him, and was the only one that was provided with any thing like a meal; but we were become so hardened against the impressions of others sufferings by our own, so familiarized to scenes of this and every other kind of misery, that the poor man's dying entreaties were vain. I sat next to him when he dropped, and having a few dried shell-fish (about five or six) in my pocket, from time to time put one in his mouth, which served only to prolong his pains; from which, however, soon after my little supply failed, he was released by death. For this, and another man I mentioned a little before to have expired under the like circumstances, when we returned from this unsuccessful enterprize, we made a grave in the sands.
It would have redounded greatly to the tenderness and humanity of Captain Cheap, if at this time he had remitted somewhat of that attention he shewed to self-preservation, which is hardly allowable but where the consequence of relieving others must be immediately and manifestly fatal to ourselves; but I would venture to affirm, that in these last affecting exigencies, as well as some others, a sparing perhaps adequate to the emergency, might have been admitted consistently with a due regard to his own necessities. The captain had better opportunities of recruiting his stock than any of us; for his rank was considered by the Indians a reason for supplying him when he would not find a bit for us. Upon the evening of the day in which these disasters happened, the captain producing a large piece of boiled seal, suffered no one to partake with him but the surgeon, who was the only man in favour at this time. We did not expect, indeed, any relief from him in our present condition, for we had a few small mussels and herbs to eat; but the men could not help expressing the greatest indignation at his neglect of the deceased, saying, that he deserved to be deserted by the rest for his savage behaviour.
The endeavouring to pass up this river was for us, who had so long struggled with hunger, a most unseasonable attempt, by which we were harassed to a degree that threatened to be fatal to more of us; but our guide, without any respect to the condition our hardships had reduced us to, was very solicitous for us to go that way, which possibly he had gone before in light canoes, but for such a boat as ours, was impracticable. We conceived, therefore, at that time, that this was some short cut, which was to bring us forward in our voyage; but we had reason to think afterwards, that the greater probability there was of his getting the barge, which was the wages of his undertaking, safe to his settlement by this, rather than another course, was his motive for preferring it to the way we took afterwards, where there was a carrying place of considerable length, over which it would have been impossible to have carried our boat.
The country hereabouts wears the most uncouth, desolate, and rugged aspect imaginable; it is so circumstanced as to discourage the most sanguine adventurers from attempts to settle in it: Were it for no other reason than the constant heavy rains, or rather torrents, which pour down here, and the vast sea and surf which the prevailing westerly winds impel upon this coast, it must be rendered inhospitable. All entrance into the woods is not only extremely difficult, but hazardous, not from any assaults you are likely to meet with from wild beasts, for even these could hardly find convenient harbour here, but from the deep swamp, which is the reigning soil of this country, and in which the woods may be said rather to float than grow; so that, except upon a range of deformed broken rocks which form the sea-coast, the traveller cannot find sound footing any where. With this unpromising scene before us we were now setting out in search of food, which nothing but the most pressing instances of hunger could induce us to do: We had, indeed, the young Indian servant to our cacique for our conductor, who was left by him to show us where the shell-fish was most plenty. The cacique was gone with the rest of his family in the canoe, with a view of getting some seal, upon a trip which would detain him from us three or four days.
After searching the coast some time with very little success, we began to think of returning to the barge; but six of the men, with the Indian, having advanced some few paces before the officers, got into the boat first, which they had no sooner done than they put off and left us, to return no more. And now all the difficulties we had hitherto endured seemed light in comparison of what we expected to suffer from this treachery of our men, who, with the boat, had taken away every thing that might be the means of preserving our lives. The little clothes we had saved from the wreck, our muskets and ammunition, were gone, except a little powder, which must be preserved for kindling fires, and one gun which I had, and was now become useless for want of ammunition; and all these wants were now come upon us at a time when we could not be worse situated for supplying them. Yet under these dismal and forlorn appearances was our delivery now preparing; and from these hopeless circumstances were we to draw hereafter an instance scarce to be paralleled, of the unsearchable ways of Providence.
It was at that time little suspected by us, that the barge, in which we founded all our hopes of escaping from this savage coast, would certainly have proved the fatal cause of detaining us till we were consumed by the labour and hardships requisite to row her round the capes and great headlands; for it was impossible to carry her by land as we did the boats of the Indians. At present, no condition could be worse than we thought ours to be: There ran at this time a very high sea, which breaking with great fury upon this coast, made it very improbable that sustenance in any proportion to our wants could be found upon it; yet unpromising as this prospect was, and though little succour could be expected from this quarter, I could not help, as I strolled along shore from the rest, casting my eyes towards the sea. Continuing thus to look out, I thought I saw something now and then upon the top of a sea that looked black, which, upon observing still more intently, I imagined at last to be a canoe; but reflecting afterwards how unusual it was for Indians to venture out in so mountainous a sea, and at such a distance from the land, I concluded myself to be deceived. However, its nearer approach convinced me, beyond all doubt, of its being a canoe; but that it could not put in any where hereabouts, but intended for some other part of the coast. I ran back as fast as I could to my companions, and acquainted them with what I had seen.
The despondency they were in would not allow them to give credit to it at first; but afterwards, being convinced that it was as I reported it, we were all in the greatest hurry to strip off some of our rags to make a signal withal, which we fixed upon a long pole. This had the desired effect: The people in the canoe seeing the signal, made towards the land at about two miles distance from us, for no boat could approach the land where we were. There they put into a small cove, sheltered by a large ledge of rocks without, which broke the violence of the sea. Captain Cheap and I walked along shore, and got to the cove about the time they landed. Here we found the persons arrived in this canoe to be our Indian guide and his wife, who had left us some days before. He would have asked us many questions, but neither Captain Cheap nor I understanding Spanish at that time, we took him along with us to the surgeon, whom we had left so ill that he could hardly raise himself from the ground.
When the Indian began to confer with the surgeon, the first question was, What was become of the barge and his companions? and as he could give him no satisfactory answer to this question, the Indian took it for granted that Emanuel was murdered by us, and that he and his family ran the same risk; upon which he was preparing to provide for his security, by leaving us directly. The surgeon seeing this, did all in his power to pacify him, and convince him of the unreasonableness of his apprehensions, which he at length found means to do, by assuring him that the Indian would come to no harm, but that he would soon see him return safe: which providentially, and beyond our expectation, happened accordingly, for in a few days after, Emanuel, having contrived to make his escape from the people in the barge, returned by ways that were impassable to any creature but an Indian. All that we could learn from Emanuel relative to his escape was, that he took the first opportunity of leaving them, which was upon their putting into a bay somewhere to the westward.