The "Duke" continued so leaky at this time, that before leaving Guam Rogers decided upon handing over to Captain Courtney a chest of plate and money to be put on board the "Dutchess." While Rogers himself "being still very weak and not able to stand," it was agreed that Captain Courtney, in the "Dutchess," should lead the squadron by night through the almost unknown straits of Molucca, and among the various reefs, shoals, and islands they must pass in the passage to the island of Bouton or Boutong, where they designed to wood and water on their way to Batavia.
The order of sailing was therefore "for the 'Dutchess' to keep ahead with a light, her pinnace when possible to be ahead of her, all signals for tacking or altering course to be given by the 'Dutchess.'" So little was this part of the world then known to the English, that even Dampier, their pilot, who had been there twice, and was the discoverer of some of these islands in 1699, seems to have lost his way; so that they were glad to get hold of the Malay skipper of a small native bark, and persuade him by bribes, in spite of his fear of the Dutch, to act as pilot between Bouton and Batavia. Rogers says, however, that "this way into India would not be difficult if better known."
After leaving Guam the weather was for some days dark, squally, and unsettled, with thunder and lightning, and mention is made of more than one ugly gale of wind, while three tropical April showers, in the form of water-spouts, were met with on the 15th of that month, one of which had like to have broke on the "Marquiss" had not the "Dutchess" broke it before it reached her, by firing two shots.[22]
[Sidenote: _A Bishop's cap presented to the King of Bouton._]
On the 29th of May, however, the four ships were safely anchored at the island of Bouton; but stayed there only long enough to water and get a supply of fresh fruit and vegetables; Rogers finding the king of the island both "dilatory and designing in his dealings with them," notwithstanding which, before sailing, they made him "a present of a Bishop's cap, a thing of little use to us, but what he highly esteem'd and gratefully accepted of."
It was on the 17th of June, 1710, near the north coast of Java, that the "Duke" and "Dutchess" met the first vessel bound east from Europe since they sailed from Bristol in August, 1708. She was a Dutch ship of 600 tons and 50 guns, from whom they learnt "that Queen Anne's Consort, Prince George of Denmark, was dead. That the wars continued in Europe, where we had good success in Flanders, but little elsewhere." And what was of more importance to them at that time than any European news, they "borrowed" from this ship, "a large draft of those parts."