ABSTRACT
THe Island of Antego lies in the Latitude of sixteen degrees and eleven minutes between Barbadoes and Desiderado. In length about Twenty Miles, and much of the same bredth; The access to it is dangerous for shipping by reason of the Rocks which incompass it; It was conceived heretofore that it was not to be inhabited upon presumption that there was no fresh Water in it, but the English who have planted themselves in it have met with some, and make Ponds and Cisterns to supply that defect, it being inhabited by eight or nine hundred Persons. The Commodities this Island affords are Sugar, Indico, Ginger and Tobacco. It abounds in tame Cattel, and all sorts of Fish, among which the Shark-Fish deserves remark; It is a kind of Sea-dog, or Sea-Wolf, the most devouring of all Fishes, & the most greedy of mans flesh & therefore dangerous to those that swim, he lives altogether by prey, and commonly follows ships to feed on the filth cast out of them into the Sea; These Monsters seem yellow in the Water, some of them of a vast length and bigness, insomuch that they are able to cut a man in two at one bite; Their Skin so rough that files are made of it to polish wood; Their heads are flat, and the opening of their mouth not just before the snout but under it, so that they are forced to turn their Bellies almost upward when they seize their Prey; Their Teeth are very sharp and broad jagged about like a Saw, of which some have three or four ranks in each Jaw-Bone, they lye within his gums, but sufficiently appear when there is occasion. These cruel Sea- Dogs / are attended by two or three small Fishes and sometimes more, which go before them with such swiftness, and exactness that they either go forward or stay as he does; The Meat of him is not good, but the brains are counted useful against the stone and Gravel.
