ABSTRACT
From the moment we tacked into the harbour we noticed two unrigged brigs anchored in the bay further to the south. Both acknowledged our ensign with the American flag. Their respective captains came on board that afternoon and informed me, as borne out by their manifests, that they had left New York fifteen or sixteen months earlier, making directly for these islands for the sole purpose of obtaining seal furs and oil. Various other vessels from the same nation were anchored in a number of nearby harbours for the same purpose, with their seamen spread out throughout the surrounding islands; their launches keeping up communication with the ships. With some delays and activities of the kind just mentioned in this work, the cargo of a single vessel often came to 20,000 seal skins and great numbers of barrels of oil. Such expeditions had already been combined with others sailing directly to the NW coast of America and China by Cabo de Hornos. Various whalers usually took part as well, and we could see no exaggeration to presume that within a few years all the moneys that the Spanish monarchy was expending in the Malvinas, however generously, would flow back into the hands of foreign traders.
