morning. We had little wind
all night, and in the morning, as soon as it was light we saw another
high peaked island; at eight it bore south-south-east half-east, distance
eight leagues: and this I knew to be Bird Isle. It is laid down in our
drafts in latitude 5 degrees 9 minutes south, which is too far southerly
by twenty-seven miles, according to our observation, and the like error
in laying down the Turtle Islands might be the occasion of our missing
them.

At night I shortened sail, for fear of coming too nigh some islands, that
stretch away bending like a half moon from Ceram towards Timor, and which
in my course I must of necessity pass through. The next morning betimes
I saw them, and found them to be at a farther distance from Bird Island
than I expected. In the afternoon it fell quite calm, and when we had a
little wind, it was so unconstant, flying from one point to another, that
I could not without difficulty get through the islands where I designed;
besides, I found a current setting to the southward, so that it was
betwixt five and six in the evening before I passed through the islands,
and then just weathered little Watela, whereas I thought to have been two
or three leagues more northerly. We saw the day before, betwixt two and
three, a spout but a small distance from us, it fell down out of a black
cloud, that yielded great store of rain, thunder and lightning; this
cloud hovered to the southward of us for the space of three hours, and
then drew to the westward a great pace, at which time it was that we saw
the spout, which hung fast to the cloud till it broke, and then the cloud
whirled about to the south-east, then to east-north-east, where meeting
with an island, it spent itself and so dispersed, and immediately we had
a little of the tail of it, having had none before. Afterwards we saw a
smoke on the island Kosiway, which continued till night.

On New Year's Day we first descried the land of New Guinea, which
appeared to be high land, and the next day we saw several high islands on
the coast of New Guinea, and ran in with the main land. The shore here
lies along east-south-east and west-north-west. It is high even land,
very well clothed with tall flourishing trees, which appeared very green,
and gave us a very pleasant prospect. We ran to the westward of four
mountainous islands, and in the night had a small tornado, which brought
with it some rain and a fair wind. We had fair weather fo