some ill design in my head, and perhaps to call them to an account for it when they came to England; and that, therefore, unless I would resolve to have done with it, and also not to concern myself any further with him, or any of his affairs, he would leave the ship; for he did not think it was safe to sail with me among them.

I heard him patiently enough till he had done, and then told him, that I confessed I had all along opposed the massacre of Madagascar, and that I had, on all occasions, spoken my mind freely about it, though not more upon him than any of the rest; that as to having no command in the ship, that was true; nor did I exercise any authority, only took the liberty of speaking my mind in things which publicly concerned us all; and what concern I had in the voyage was none of his business; that I was a considerable owner in the ship; in that claim, Í conceived I had a right to speak even further than I had done, and would not be accountable to him or any one else; and egan to be a little warm with him. He made but little reply to me at that time, and I thought the affair had been over. W were at this time in the road at Bengal; and being willing to sce the place, I went on shore with the supercargo, in the ship's boat, to divert myself; and towards evening was preparing to go on board, when one of the men came to me, and told me he would not have me trouble myself to come down to the boat, for they had orders not to carry me on board any more. Any one may guess what a surprise I was in, at so insolent a message; and I asked the man who bade him deliver that message to me. He told me, the cockswain. I said no more to the fellow, but bade him let them know he had delivered his message, and that I had given him no answer to it.

I immediately went and found out the supercargo, and told him the story; adding, what I presently foresaw, that there would be a mutiny in the ship, and entreated him to go immediately on board the ship in an Indian boat, and acquaint the captain of it. But I might have spared this intelligence; for before I had spoken to him on shore, the matter was effected on board. The boatswain, the gunner, the carpenter, and

all the inferior officers, as soon as I was gone off in the boat, came up and desired to speak with the captain; and there the boatswain, making a long harangue, and repeating all he had said to me, told the captain, in a few words, that as I was now gone peaceably on shore, they were loath to use any violence with me, which, if I had not gone on shore, they would otherwise have done, to oblige me to have gone; they therefore thought fit to tell him, that as they shipped themselves to serve in the ship under his command, they would perform it well and faithfully; but if I would not quit the ship, or the captain oblige me to quit it, they would all leave the ship, and sail no farther with him; and at that word all, he turned his face toward the mainmast, which was, it seems, the signal agreed on between them, at which all the seamen, being got together, there cried out," One and all! one and all!

My nephew, the captain, was a man of spirit, and of great presence of mind; and though he was surprised, you may be ure, at the thing, yet he told them calmly that he would consider of the matter; but that he could do nothing in it till he had spoken to me about it. He used some arguments with them to show them the unreasonableness and injustice of the thing; but it was all in vain; they swore and shook hands round before his face, that they would all go on shore, unless he would engage to them not to suffer me to come any more on board the ship.

This was a hard article upon him, who knew his obligation to me, and did not know how I might take it: so he began to talk smartly to them; told them that I was a very considerable owner of the ship, and that, in justice, he could not put me out of my own house; that this was next door to serving me as the famous pirate Kidd had done, who made a mutiny in the ship, set the captain on shore on an uninhabited island, and ran away with the ship; that let them go into what ship they would, if ever they came to England again, it would cost them very dear; that the ship was mine, and that he could not put me out of it; and that he would rather lose the ship, and the voyage too, than disoblige me so much; so they might do as

they pleased; however, he would go on shore and talk with me and invited the boatswain to go with him, and perhaps they might accommodate the matter with me. But they all rejected the proposal, and said they would have nothing to do with me any more; and if I came on board, they would all go on shore. Well," said the captain, "if you are all of this mind, let me go on shore and talk with him." So away he came to me with this account, a little after the message had been brought to me from the cockswain.

I was very glad to see my nephew, I must confess; for I was not without apprehensions that they would confine him by violence, set sail, and run away with the ship; and then I had been stripped naked in a remote country, having nothing to help myself; in short, I had been in a worse case than when I was alone in the island. But they had not come that length, it seems, to my satisfaction; and when my nephew told me what they had said to him, and how they had sworn and shook hands that they would, one and all, leave the ship if I was suffered to come on board, I told him he should not be concerned at it at all, for I would stay on shore; I only desired he would take care and send me all my necessary things on shore, and leave me a sufficient sum of money, and I would find my way to England as well as I could.

This was a heavy piece of news to my nephew, but there was no way to help it but to comply; so, in short, he went on board the ship again, and satisfied the men that his uncle had yielded to their importunity, and had sent for his goods from on board the ship; so that the matter was over in a few hours, the men returned to their duty, and I began to consider what course I should steer.

I was now alone in the most remote part of the world, as I think I may call it, for I was near three thousand leagues by sea farther off from England than I was at my island; only, it is true, I might travel here by land over the Great Mogul's country to Surat, might go from thence to Bassora by sea, up the Gulf of Persia, and take the way of the caravans, over the Desert of Arabia, to Aleppo and Scanderoon; from thence by

sea again to Italy, and so over land into France; and this put together might at least be a full diameter of the globe, or more.

I had another way before me, which was to wait for some English ships, which were coming to Bengal from Achin, on the island of Sumatra, and get passage on board them for England. But as I came hither without any concern with the English East India Company, so it would be difficult to go from hence without their license, unless with great favor of the captains of the ships, or the Company's factors; and to both I was an utter stranger.

Here I had the mortification to see the ship set sail without me; a treatment I think a man in my circumstances scarce ever met with, except from pirates running away with a ship, and setting those that would not agree with their villany on shore. Indeed this was next door to it, both ways; however, my nephew left me two servants, or rather one companion and one servant; the first was clerk to the purser, whom he engaged to go with me, and the other was his own servant. I took me also a good lodging in the house of an Englishwoman, where several merchants lodged, some French, two Italians, or rather Jews, and one Englishman: here I was handsomely enough entertained; and that I might not be said to run rasmiy upon any thing, I staid here above nine months, considering what course to take, and how to manage myself. I had some English goods with me of value, and a considerable sum of money; my nephew furnishing me with a thousand pieces-of-eight, and a letter of credit for more, if I had occasion, that I might not be straitened, whatever might happen.

I quickly disposed of my goods to advantage; and, as I originally intended, I bought here some very good diamonds, which, of all other things, were the most proper for me, in my present circumstances, because I could always carry my whole

estate about me.

After a long stay here, and many proposals made for my return to England, but none falling out to my mind, the English merchant who lodged with me, and whom I had contracted an intimate acquaintance with, came to me one morning: “Coun

tryman," says he, "I have a project to communicate to yon, which, as it suits with my thoughts, may, for aught I know suit with yours also, when you shall have thoroughly considered it. Here we are posted, you by accident, and I by my own choice, in a part of the world very remote from our own country; but it is in a country where, by us who understand trade. and business, a great deal of money is to be got. If you will put one thousand pounds to my one thousand pounds, we will hire a ship here, the first we can get to our minds; you shall be captain, I'll be merchant, and we'll go a trading voyage to China; for what should we stand still for? The whole world is in a motion, rolling round and round; all the creatures of God, heavenly bodies and earthly, are busy and diligent; why should we be idle? There are no drones in the world but men; why should we be of that number ?"

I liked this proposal very well; and the more because it seemed to be expressed with so much good will, and in so friendly a manner. I will not say but that I might, by my loose, unhinged circumstances, be the fitter to embrace a proposal for trade, or indeed any thing else; whereas, otherwise, trade was none of my element. However, I might perhaps say with some truth, that if trade was not my element, rambling was; and no proposal for seeing any part of the world, which I had never seen before, could possibly come amiss to me.

It was, however, some time before we could get a ship to our minds, and when we had got a vessel, it was not easy to get English sailors; that is to say, so many as were necessary to govern the voyage and manage the sailors which we should pick up there. After some time we got a mate, a boatswain, and a gunner, English; a Dutch carpenter, and three foremast-men. With these we found we could do well enough, having Indian seamen, such as they were, to make up.

There are so many travellers who have wrote the history of their voyages and travels this way, that it would be very little Jiversion to any body to give a long account of the places we went to, and the people who inhabit there: these things I icave to others, and refer the reader to those journals and