XXIV 
Introduction 
an island, generally supposed to be Mascareigne, to which 
he gave the name of England’s Forest; and in the 
account of his voyage written by J. Tatton we read :— 
‘ There is store of Land-fowl both small and great, plenty of 
Doves, great Parrots, and such like; and a great fowl of the 
bigness of a Turkie, very fat, and so short-winged that they 
cannot flie, beeing white, and in a manner lame; and so are 
all other fowles, as having not been troubled nor feared with 
shot. Our men did beate them down with sticks and stones. 
Ten men may take fowle enough to serve forty men a day.’ 1 
Six years afterwards a famous Dutchman, Willem 
Ysbrantsz. Bontekoe van Hoorn, made an adventurous 
voyage to the East Indies. His well-known journal became 
most popular, and went through many editions, some of 
which are exceedingly rare. 2 He landed his sick crew on 
the island of Maskarinas in 1619, and his journal states :— 
‘We found there also a quantity of geese, pigeons, grey 
parrots, and other sorts of birds; numbers of tortoises, of which 
there were sometimes twenty-five under the shade of a tree: 
We took of all these animals as many as we wanted, for they 
did not run away. There were also some dodos who small wings 
had , but could not fly; [they\ were so fat that \they\ hardly go 
could , because as they walked , dragged her the bottom along the 
ground? But that which was most pleasant was that when we 
1 ‘ The first day we descried land; it bore south-west from us: by its height, 
shape and position, wee knew ’twas that our Captaines called England’s 
Forrest: next day we attained it. The name was, Anno 1613, imposed by 
Captaine Castleton , Commander of the Pearle (a ship I meane): some say 
the errant Portugall first saw it, and by Seignior Mascarenas from his owne 
name was denominated ; yet other-some go further and call it Pulo-jbuar , an 
Indian name, but by whom or when, darkly writ in the mistique Character of 
Oblivion.’— Some Yeares Travels into Africa and Asia the Great , etc. By 
Tho. Herbert, Esqre. Lib. 3, p. 351. London, 1638. 
2 Strickland quotes from an edition, published at Amsterdam by Gillis 
Joosten Zaagman circa 1670, which contains a quaint figure of the Dodaers. 
A facsimile of this engraving is here given, photographed from the copy 
of this version in possession of Professor Newton, p. 7. 
3 In the original, this paragraph reads:— c Daer waren oock eenige Dod- 
eersen | die kleyne vleugels hadden | maer konden niet vliegen | waren so vet 
datse qualijck gaen konden | want als sy liepen | sleepte haer de neers by 
na langs de Aerde.’ These words have been literally translated, as above, by 
Mr. J. H. Hessels, of Cambridge. 
