PORTER’S JOURNAL* 
201 
no bottom with 22 fathoms of line, and on the strictest examina- 
tion, could find no fresh water, although I went on shore at every 
place where it was possible for a boat to land; and I can say with 
safety, that the Island of La Plata affords no fresh water, except 
during heavy rains, which are very uncommon on this coast; nor 
does it afford wood in sufficient quantities to supply ships. 
This island has been much frequented by the pearl fishers, 
and those employed in salting fish, of which we had sufficient tes¬ 
timony in the large piles of shells of the pearl oyster, as well as 
considerable heaps of salt, and ground cleared away, levelled, and 
otherwise prepared for drying fish, which are more abundant at 
this island than any other place I have visited in those seas, and 
are of the same kind as those found among the Gallapagos. The 
only birds we found here were boobies, and man-of-war hawks. 
We saw no seals on or about the island, and only two turtles were 
seen, and they some distance from the shore. No animals or their 
traces were discovered on the shore ; and the aspect of the whole 
island was the most desolate imaginable. It is about eight miles 
in circumference, and offers no advantages whatever, that I could 
discover, to induce navigators to touch there ; and although it is 
represented to have been a favourite resort for the buccaniers, who 
stopped there for the purpose of watching the Spanish fleets, I am 
induced to believe that the want of anchorage would have preven¬ 
ted their using it for that purpose, although I acknowledge that 
its want of every other advantage prevented my giving it so strict 
an examination in that respect as I should otherwise have done. 
As I thought it not unlikely that Mr. Downes would touch at 
this place, with the expectation of finding letters from me, I left 
one suspended in a bottle on the branch of a bush, at the western 
part of the sand beach; and to attract his attention to this place, 
I painted on the side of a rock the two letters S. X., of so large 
a size as to be seen at a considerable distance. The sound of 
these two letters approaching so near to that of the name of the 
frigate, would be a sufficient proof to lieutenant Downes of our 
having been there, and would naturally lead to a strict search for 
further information respecting us; while, at the same time, they 
would be incomprehensible to any other person, as my letter wm 
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VOL. I. 
