414 



A VOYAGE TO 



1779- breakers clofe under our lee. At day-light, we favv the 

 v . w _ ', ifland of Prata ; and at half pad fix we wore again, and Hood 

 toward the fhoal, and finding we could not weather it, bore 

 away, and ran to leeward. As we parTed the South fide, 

 within a mile of the reef, we obferved two remaik.ible 

 patches on the edge of the breakers, that looked like wrecks. 

 At noon, the latitude found by double altitudes was 20" 39', 

 longitude ii6°45'. The ifland bore North three quarters 

 Eaft, did ant three or four leagues. On the South Well fide 

 of the reef, and near the South end of the ifland, we thought 

 we faw, from the maft head, openings in the reef, which 

 promifed fafe anchorage. 



The Prata fhoal is of a confiderable extent, being .fix 

 leagues from Norrh to South, and flretching three or four 

 leagues to the Eaftwai d of the ifland ; its limit to the Weft- 

 ward we were not in a fituation to determine. The North 

 Eaft extremity we place in latitude 20° 5 ', and longitude 

 1 1 7 ; and the South Weft in latitude ^o° 45', and longitude 



60 / 



44. 



For the remaining part of the day we carried a prefs of 

 fail, and kept the wind, which was North Eaft by North, in 

 order to fecure our paflageto Macao. It was fortunate, that 

 toward evening the wind favoured us, by changing two points 

 more to the Eaft; for had the wind and weather continued 

 the fame as during the preceding week, I doubt whether 

 we could have fetched that port, in which cafe we mull have 

 born away for Batavia ; a place we all dreaded exceedingly, 

 from the fad havoc the unheilthinefs of the climate had 

 made in the crews of the former fhips that had been out on 

 difcovery, and had touched there. 



In 



