oosed our land fastnings
with all expedition, weighed our anchor, and towed off into the channel;
for we had repaired our boat when in Port Desire, and got five oars from
the Black pinnace. On weighing our anchor we found the cable sore
broken, holding only by one strand, which was a most merciful
preservation. We now reeved our ropes and rigged our ship the best we
could, every man working as if to save our lives in the utmost
extremity. Our company was now much divided in opinion as to how we
should proceed for the best; some desiring to return to Port Desire, to
be there set on shore, and endeavour to travel by land to some of the
Spanish settlements, while others adhered to the captain and master: But
at length, by the persuasion of the master, who promised that they would
find wheat, pork, and roots in abundance at the island of St Mary,
besides the chance of intercepting some ships on the coasts of Chili and
Peru, while nothing but a cruel death by famine could be looked for in
attempting to return by the Atlantic, they were prevailed upon to
proceed.

So, on the 2d of October, 1592, we again made sail into the South Sea,
and got free from the land. This night the wind again began to blow very
strong at west, and increased with such violence that we were in great
doubt what measures to pursue. We durst not put into the straits for
lack of ground tackle, neither durst we carry sail, the tempest being
very furious, and our sails very bad. In this extremity the pinnace bore
up to us, informing she had received many heavy seas, and that her ropes
were continually failing, so that they knew not what to do; but, unable
to afford her any relief; we stood on our course in view of a lee shore,
continually dreading a ruinous end of us all. The 4th October the storm
increased to an extreme violence; when the pinnace, being to windward,
suddenly _struck a hull_, when we thought she had sustained some violent
shock of a sea, or had sprung a leak, or that her sails had failed,
because she did not follow us. But we durst not _hull_ in this
unmerciful storm, sometimes _trying_ under our main-course, sometimes
with a _haddock_ of our sail; for our ship was very _leeward_, and
laboured hard in the sea. This night we lost sight of the pinnace, and
never saw her again.

The 5th October, our foresail split, on which our master brought the
mizen-sail to the foremast to make the ship work, and we mended our
foresail with our spritsail