about five in the afternoon
Marble jumped up on a thwart , too and no longer disputed my word . It was land , he admitted , and it must be the island of Bourbon , which we had passed to the northward , and must soon have given a hopelessly wide berth . We went to the oars again with renewed life , and soon made the boat spin . All that day we kept rowing , until about five in the afternoon , when we found ourselves within a few leagues of the island of Bourbon , where we were met by a fresh breeze from the southward , and were compelled to make sail . The wind was dead on end , and we made stretches under the lee of the island , going about as we found the sea getting to be too heavy for us , as was invariably the case whenever we got too far east or west . In a word , a lee was fast becoming necessary . By ten , we were within a mile of the shore , but saw no place where we thought it safe to attempt a landing in the dark ; a long , heavy sea setting in round both sides of the island , though the water did not break much where we remained .