A58039:71
A token for mariners
A token for mariners containing many famous and wonderful instances of God's providence in sea dangers and deliverances, in mercifully preserving the lives of his poor creatures, when, in humane probability, at the point of perishing by shipwreck, famine, or other accidents. much enlarged, with the addition of many new relations, one whereof happening this present year, and never before printed. Mostly attested by the persons themselves. Also The seaman's preacher, being a sermon on the right improvement of such mercies. And prayers for seamen on all occasions.A token for mariners containing many famous and wonderful instances of God's providence in sea dangers and deliverances, in mercifully preserving the lives of his poor creatures, when, in humane probability, at the point of perishing by shipwrack, famine, or other accidents. much enlarg'd, with the addition of many new relations, one whereof happening this present year, and never before printed. Mostly attested by the persons themselves. Also The seaman's preacher, being a sermon on the right improvement of such mercies. And prayers for seamen on all occasions.
London: printed by Hugh Newman, 1698
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Having thus fitted every thing in the best manner they could, on the twelfth of September, looking out into the Sound, they espied two Sea-horses lying asleep on a piece of Ice, whereupon, taking up an old harping-iron, they hastened to them, and first slew the old one, and then the young; and so bringing them ashore, they […] them, roasted, and eat them. Not long after they killed another; but the nights and cold weather increasing on them, and they viewing their Provision, found it too small by half; whereupon they stinted themselves to one reasonable meal a day, and agreed to fast Wednesdays and Fridays, excepting from the Graves or Fritters of the Whale (which was a very loathsome meat) of which they allowed themselves sufficient for ⟨p. 65⟩their present hunger: at which diet they continued about three months.
Having thus fitted every thing in the best manner they could, on the twelfth of September, looking out into the Sound, they espied two Sea-horses lying asleep on a piece of Ice, whereupon, taking up an old harping-iron, they hastn'd to them, and first slew the old one, and then the young; and so bringing them ashore, they 〈…〉 them, roasted, and eat them. Not long after they kill'd another; but the nights and cold weather encreasing on them, and they viewing their Provision, found it too small by half; whereupon they stinted themselves to one reasonable meal a day, and agreed to fast Wednesdays and Fridays, excepting from the Graves or Fritters of the Whale (which was a very loathsome meat) of which they allow'd themselves sufficient for ⟨p. 65⟩their present hunger: at which diet they continu'd about three months.
Having finished whatever they could invent for their preservation; they found that all their Clothes and Shoes were worn, and torn; to repair which, they had this new devise; of Rope-yarn they made thread, and of Whale-bones needles to sew their Clothes withal: But October the tenth, the nights being grown very long, and the cold so violent, that all the Sea was frozen over; and they having now nothing to exercise their minds upon, were troubled with a thousand imaginations: Sometimes they bewailed their absence from their Wives and Children, thinking what grief it would be to them to hear of their miscarriage: then thought they of their Parents, and what a cutting corrosive it would be to them to hear of their untimely deaths, &c. and being thus tormented in their minds with fear, and grief, and pinched in their bodies with hunger, and cold, the hideous monster of desperation presented his ugliest shape unto them: But thinking it not best to give way to grief and fear, they doubled their prayers to Almighty God for strength and patience in their miseries, by whose assistance, they