Seeking harbor on the coast of Brazil to obtain wood and water, the Speedwell fell in with a French man-of-war whose commander and officers were invited aboard the privateer for dinner. The crew was inconsiderate enough to touch off another mutiny, which interrupted the pleasant party; but the French guests gallantly sailed into the ruction, and their swords assisted in restoring order, after which dinner was finished. Captain Shelvocke apologized for the behavior of his crew, and explained that "it was the source of melancholy reflection that he, who had been an officer thirty years in the service should now be continually harassed by the mutiny of turbulent people." Most of them were for deserting, but he rounded them up ashore and clubbed them into the boats, and the Speedwell sailed to dare the Cape Horn passage.
For two long months she was beating off Terra del Fuego and fighting her way into the Pacific, spars and rigging sheathed in ice, the landlubbers benumbed and useless, decks swept by the Cape Horn combers; but Captain George Shelvocke had never a thought in his head of putting back and quitting the golden adventure. He finally made the coast of Chile, at the island of Chiloé, and when the Spanish governor of the little settlement refused to sell him provisions, he went ashore and
