See how it appeared to us at several views as we were compassing the east and south-east and south of it, to get to the road, on the south-west of it, and the road itself.

THE AUTHOR'S ARRIVAL AT MAYO.

I got not in till the next day, February 11, when I come to an anchor in the road, which is the leeward part of the island; for it is a general rule never to anchor to windward of an island between the tropics. We anchored at 11 o'clock in 14 fathom clean sand, and very smooth water, about three-quarters of a mile from the shore, in the same place where I anchored in my voyage round the world; and found riding here the Newport of London, a merchantman, Captain Barefoot commander, who welcomed me with 3 guns and I returned one for thanks. He came from Fayal, one of the western islands; and had store of wine and brandy aboard. He was taking in salt to carry to Newfoundland, and was very glad to see one of the King's ships, being before our coming afraid of pirates, which of late years had much infested this and the rest of the Cape Verde Islands.

I have given some account of the island of Mayo and of other of these islands in my Voyage round the World, but I shall now add some further observations that occurred to me in this voyage. The island of Mayo is about 7 leagues in circumference, of a roundish form, with many small rocky points shooting out into the sea a mile or more. Its latitude is 15 degrees north, and as you sail about the isle, when you come pretty nigh the shore, you will see the water breaking off from those points; which you must give a berth to and avoid them. I sailed at this time two parts in three round the island, but saw nothing dangerous besides these points; and they all showed themselves by the breaking of the water: yet it is reported that on the north and north-north-west side there are dangerous shoals that lie farther off at sea; but I was not on that side. There are 2 hills on this island of a considerable height; one pretty bluff, the other peaked at top. The rest of the island is pretty level and of a good height from the sea. The shore clear round hath sandy bays between the rocky points I spoke of, and the whole island is a very dry sort of soil.

OF THE CAPE VERDE ISLANDS; ITS SALT POND COMPARED WITH THAT OF SALT TORTUGA; ITS TRADE FOR SALT, AND FRAPE-BOATS.

On the west side of the isle where the road for ships is, there is a large sandy bay and a sandbank of about 40 paces wide within it which runs along the shore 2 or 3 miles; within which there is a large salina or salt pond, contained between the sandbank and the hills beyond it. The whole salina is about 2 miles in length, and half a mile wide; but above one half of it its commonly dry. The north end only of the pond never wants water, producing salt from November till May, which is here the dry season of the year. The water which yields this salt works in from out of the sea through a hole in the sandbank before mentioned, like a sluice, and that only in spring tides when it fills the pond more or less, according to the height of the tides. If there is any salt in the ponds when the flush of water comes in it presently dissolves: but then in 2 or 3 days after it begins to kern; and so continues kerning till either all or the greatest part of the salt water is congealed or kerned; or till a fresh supply of it comes in again from the sea. This water is known to come in only at that one passage on the north part of the pond; where also it is deepest. It was at a spring of the new moon when I was there; and I was told that it comes in at no other time but at the new moon spring tides; but why that should be I can't guess. They who come hither to lade salt rake it up as it kerns, and lay it in heaps on the dry land, before the water breaks in anew: and this is observable of this salt pond, that the salt kerns only in the dry season, contrary to the salt ponds in the West Indies, particularly those of the island Salt Tortuga, which I have formerly mentioned, for they never kern there till the rains come in about April; and continue to do so in May, June, July etc. while the wet season lasts; and not without some good shower of rain first: but the reason also of this difference between the salt ponds of Mayo and those of the West Indies why these should kern in the wet season, and the former in the dry season, I shall leave to philosophers.

Our nation drives here a great trade for salt, and have commonly a man-of-war here for the guard of our ships and barks that come to take it in; of which I have been informed that in some years there have not been less than 100 in a year. It costs nothing but men's labour to rake it together, and wheel it out of the pond, except the carriage: and that also is very cheap; the inhabitants having plenty of asses for which they have little to do besides carrying the salt from the ponds to the seaside at the season when ships are here. The inhabitants lade and drive their asses themselves, being very glad to be employed; for they have scarce any other trade but this to get a penny by. The pond is not above half a mile from the landing-place, so that the asses make a great many trips in a day. They have a set number of turns to and fro both forenoon and afternoon, which their owners will not exceed. At the landing-place there lies a frape-boat, as our seamen call it, to take in the salt. It is made purposely for this use, with a deck reaching from the stern a third part of the boat; where there is a kind of bulkhead that rises not from the boat's bottom but from the edge of the deck to about 2 foot in height; all caulked very tight. The use of it is to keep the waves from dashing into the boat when it lies with its head to the shore to take in salt: for here commonly runs a great sea; and when the boat lies so with its head to the shore the sea breaks in over the stern, and would soon fill it was it not for this bulkhead, which stops the waves that come flowing upon the deck and makes them run off into the sea on each side. To keep the boat thus with the head to the shore and the stern to the sea there are two strong stanchions set up in the boat, the one at the head, the other in the middle of it, against the bulkhead, and a foot higher than the bulkhead. There is a large notch cut in the top of each of these stanchions big enough for a small hawser or rope to lie in; one end of which is fastened to a post ashore, and the other to a grappling or anchor lying a pretty way off at sea: this rope serves to haul the boat in and out, and the stanchions serve to keep her fast, so that she cannot swing to either side when the rope is hauled tight: for the sea would else fill her, or toss her ashore and stave her. The better to prevent her staving and to keep her the tighter together there are two sets of ropes more: the first going athwart from gunwale to gunwale, which, when the rowers benches are laid, bind the boats sides so hard against the ends of the benches that they cannot easily fall asunder, while the benches and ropes mutually help each other; the ropes keeping the boat's sides from flying off, and the benches from being crushed together inwards. Of these ropes there are usually but two, dividing the boat's length as they go across the sides into three equal parts. The other set of ropes are more in number, and are so placed as to keep the ribs and planks of the boat from starting off. For this purpose there are holes made at certain distances through the edge of the keel that runs along on the inside of the boat; through which these ropes passing are laid along the ribs so as to line them, or be themselves as ribs upon them, being made fast to them by rattans brought thither, or small cords twisted close about both ropes and ribs, up to the gunwale: by which means though several of the nails or pegs of the boat should by any shock fall out, yet