Richard of Jamestown | Page 8

were the Virgin islands, and here the men went ashore again to hunt; but my master, speaking no harsh words against those who were wronging him, lay in the small, stinging hot room, unable to get for himself even a cup of water, though I took good care he should not suffer from lack of kindly care.
Then on a certain day we sailed past that land which Captain Gosnold told me was Porto Rico, and next morning came to anchor off the island of Mona, where the seamen were sent ashore to get fresh water, for our supply was running low.
Captain Newport, and many of the other gentlemen, went on shore to hunt, and so great was the heat that Master Edward Brookes fell down dead, one of the sailors telling Nathaniel that the poor man's fat was melted until he could no longer live; but Captain Smith, who knows more concerning such matters than all this company rolled into one, save I might except Master Hunt, declared that the fat of a live person does not melt, however great the heat. It is the sun shining too fiercely on one's head that brings about death, and thus it was that Master Brookes died.

A VARIETY OF WILD GAME
Our gentlemen who had the heart to make prisoner of so honest, upright a man as my master, did not cease their sport because of what had befallen Master Brookes, but continued at the hunting until they had brought down two wild boars and also an animal fashioned like unto nothing I had ever seen before. It was something after the manner of a serpent, but speckled on the stomach as is a toad, and Captain Smith believed the true name of it to be Iguana, the like of which he says that he has often seen in other countries and that its flesh makes very good eating.
If any one save Captain Smith had said this, I should have found it hard to believe him, and as it was I was glad my belief was not put to the test. Two days afterward we were come to an island which Master Hunt says is known to seamen as Monica, and there it was that Nathaniel went on shore in one of the boats, coming back at night to tell me a most wondrous story.
He declared that the birds and their eggs were so plentiful that the whole island was covered with them; that one could not set down his foot, save upon eggs, or birds sitting on their nests, some of which could hardly be driven away even with blows, and when they rose in the air, the noise made by their wings was so great as to deafen a person.
Our seamen loaded two boats full of the eggs in three hours, and all in the fleet feasted for several days on such as had not yet been spoiled by the warmth of the birds' bodies.
It was on the next day that we left behind us those islands which Captain Smith told me were the West Indies, and the seaman who stood at the helm when I came on deck to get water for my master, said we were steering a northerly course, which would soon bring us to the land of Virginia.

THE TEMPEST
On that very night, however, such a tempest of wind and of rain came upon us that I was not the only one who believed the Susan Constant must be crushed like an eggshell under the great mountains of water which at times rolled completely over her, so flooding the decks that but few could venture out to do whatsoever of work was needed to keep the ship afloat. After this fierce tempest, when the Lord permitted that even our pinnace should ride in safety, it was believed that we were come near to the new world, and by day and by night the seamen stood at the rail, throwing the lead every few minutes in order to discover if we were venturing into shoal water.
Nathaniel and I used to stand by watching them, and wishing that we might be allowed to throw the line, but never quite getting up our courage to say so, knowing full well we should probably make a tangle of it.

THE NEW COUNTRY SIGHTED
As Master George Percy has set down in the writings which I have copied for him since we came to Virginia, it was on the twenty-sixth day of April, in the year of our Lord 1607, at about four o'clock in the morning, when we were come within sight of that land where were to be built homes, not only for our company of one hundred and five, counting the boys, but for all who should come after us.
It was while the