He may be months before he gets round the Horn, and if we could manage to be there when he arrives, we should be rescued.

If not, and I own that I have not much hope of it, we could at least go down to Lima some time or other.

I can talk Spanish now very fairly, and we shall have such a lot of adventures to tell that, even if they do not take us for Spanish sailors, as we can try to feign, they will not be likely to put us to death.

They would do so if we were taken in arms as buccaneers; but, coming in peaceably, we might be kindly treated.

At any rate, if we get on well with the Indians we shall have the choice of making, some day or other, for the Spanish settlements on the west coast; but that is all in the distance.