1.The same day I went on board we set sail, standing away tobthe northward upon our own coast, with design to stretch over for the African coast when they came about 10 or 12 degrees of northern latitude, which it seems was the manner of their course in those day. We had very good weather, only excessive hot, all the way upon our own coast till we came to the height of Cape St. Augustino; from whence, keeping farther off at sea, we lost sight of land, and steered as if we were bound for the isle Fernando de Noronha, holding our course N.E. by N. and leaving those isles on the east. In this course we passed the line in about tweleve days' time, and were by our last observation in 7 degrees 22 minutes northern latitude, when a violent tornado or hurricane took us guite out of our knowledge. It began from the southeast, came about to the northwest, and then settled into the northeast, from whence it blew in such a terrible manner that for tweleve days together we could do nothing but drive, and scudding away before it, let it carry us whither ever fate and the fury of the winds directed; and during these twelve days I need not say that I expected every day to be swallowed up, nor indeed did any in the ship expect to save their lives.
In this distress we had, besides the terror of the strom, one of our men die of the fever and one oman and the boy washed overboard. About the twelfth day, the weather abating a little, the master made an observation as well as he could, and found he was in about 11 degrees north latitude, but that he was 22 degrees of longtitude difference west from Cape St. Augustino; so that he found he was gotten upon the coast of Guiana, or the north part of Brazil, beyond the river Amezon, toward that of the river Orinoco, commonly called the Grest River, and began too consult with me what course he should take, for the ship waa leaky and very much disabled, and he was going directly back to the coast of Brazil.