, another species of danger here, against
which cork-jackets afforded no defence, for the sea abounded with sharks
of an enormous, size, which, when they saw a man in the water, would
dart into the very surf to seize him: Our people, however, happily
escaped them, though they were many times very near: One of them, which
was upwards of twenty feet-long, came close to one of the boats that was
watering, and having seized a large seal, instantly devoured it at one
mouthful; and I myself saw another of nearly the same size do the same
thing under the ship's stern. Our people killed and sent off several of
the goats, which we thought as good as the best venison in England; and
I observed, that one of them appeared to have been caught and marked,
its right ear being slit in a manner that could not have happened by
accident.[35] We had also fish in such plenty, that one boat would, with
hooks and lines, catch, in a few hours, as much as would serve a large
ship's company two days: They were of various sorts, all excellent in
their kind, and many of them weighed from twenty to thirty pounds.

[Footnote 35: The other account says the same of two of the goats caught
here, and conjectures, as no traces of inhabitants were then to be
discovered in the island, that "some solitary Selkirk had dwelt there,
who, like his namesake at Juan Fernandez, when he caught more than he
wanted, marked them and let them go." Captain Carteret gives some
particulars respecting this island, to which the reader is
referred.--E.]

This evening, the surf running very high, the gunner and one of the
seamen who were on shore with the waterers, were afraid to venture off,
and the boat therefore, when she came on board the last time, left them
behind her.

The next day we found a more convenient watering-place about a mile and
a half to the northward of the ship, and about the middle-way between
the north and south points of the island, there being at this place less
surf than where the boats first went on shore. The tide here set twelve
hours to the northward, and twelve to the southward, which we found very
convenient, for as the wind was southerly, with a great swell, the boats
could not otherwise have got on board with their water. We got off ten
tons of water from the new watering-place this day, and in the afternoon
I sent a boat to fetch off the gunner and seaman, who had been left on
shore at the old watering-place the night before; but the surf