EXPEDITION TO SURINAM. 



II 



withoiit-board in the main-chains, I fortunately grafped CHAP, 

 hold of him in his fall, which faved him^ as he could not , ^ ^' , 

 fwim, from inevitable death. 



The entrance into warmer regions gave occalion to 

 an obfervation perhaps not generally known, . which 

 (though uncouth) muft be of great importance to Tai- 

 lors ; namely, that between the Tropics, while vermin 

 may remain in the head, none can poffibiy continue 

 to exift in the bedding, cloaths, linen, &c. Having 

 humbly apologized for the above remark to my delicate 

 readers, I will endeavour to defcribe a curious ani- 

 mal with which thefe feas abound, and which appears 

 to fail on the furface of the waves with a fide-wind, 

 while by the failors it is vulgarly called a Portuguefe 

 man-of-war, and is probably either the Nautilus or the 

 Argonaut a of Linnaeus. This wonderful creature, when 

 above water, affumes the fliape of an expanded fan, de- 

 corated with a beautiful red border, while the lower ex- 

 tremity is fixed to a fliell as thin as paper, or rather a 

 kind of boat, which is funk below or raifed above the 

 furface of the fea, and guided in any direction, at the 

 pleafure of the animal, by means of fix tentacula or limbs, 

 which it ufes as oars. When thefe creatures are touched 

 by the hand, they occalion, like the fea blubber or jelly ' 

 fifh, a painful tinkling fenfation, which continues for 

 feveral minutes. 



The two following days it blew very frelli, and heavy 

 feas waihed over the vefTel ; during which, while helping 

 to put a reef in the main-top-fail for ahttle exercife, I loft 



C 2 



•very 



