Travels in India (Tavernier) 149.1.5

149.1.5

They were two Hamburghers, who had seen me previously at Bandar-Abbas and Surat, and they well knew that I carried all my goods on my person, without having need of camels or mules to carry them. As soon as I promised them this sum they took a spar of wood of the thickness of a man’s thigh and 8 or 10 feet long, attaching to it thick ropes in five or six places, to each of which they allowed a length of only 3 or 4 feet. As they worked at it I kept my eyes constantly fixed in the direction of the land, and I observed that the vessel did not go straight as it had done previously. I feared that it was only the darkness which made me think so, for the moon began to set. I hastened at once to the compass to assure myself, and I saw as a matter of fact that the wind had altogether changed and came from the land. Immediately I cried out to the sailors that the wind had become favourable, and at the same moment the boatswain, who directs all that appertains to the vessel, made a great noise and called all the sailors. He also hailed the fourteen men whom they had placed in the large boat, believing that they were there still; but no one replied, and we saw at daybreak that the cable had parted, and we were never able to ascertain what had become of them. As for the captain, he was unable to rise on account of a severe attack of fever which the pain in his hand had caused him.