I removed from the Old Jewry to Fetter Lane, and from thence to Wapping, hoping to get business among the sailors; but it would not turn to account.

After three years' expectation that things would mend, I accepted an advantageous offer from Captain William Prichard, master of the "Antelope," who was making a voyage to the South Sea.[5] We set sail from Bristol, May 4, 1699; and our voyage at first was very prosperous.
It would not be proper, for some reasons, to trouble the reader with the particulars of our adventures in those seas.

Let it suffice to inform him, that, in our passage from thence to the East Indies, we were driven by a violent storm, to the northwest of Van Diemen's Land.[6] By an observation, we found ourselves in the latitude of 30 degrees and 2 minutes south.

Twelve of our crew were dead by immoderate labor and ill food; the rest were in a very weak condition.
On the fifth of November, which was the beginning of summer in those parts, the weather being very hazy, the seamen spied a rock within half a cable's length of the ship;[7] but the wind was so strong, that we were driven directly upon it, and immediately split.

Six of the crew, of whom I was one, having let down the boat into the sea, made a shift to get clear of the ship and the rock.