"Beagle" touched at Madeira for a confirmed position without stopping. Then on 6 January, it reached Tenerife in the Canary Islands but was quarantined there because of cholera in England. Although tantalisingly near to the town of Santa Cruz, to Darwin's intense disappointment, they were denied landing. With improving weather conditions, they sailed on. On 10 January, Darwin tried out a plankton net he had devised to be towed behind the ship – only the second recorded use of such a net (after use by John Vaughan Thompson in 1816). Next day, he noted the great number of animals collected far from land and wrote: "Many of these creatures so low in the scale of nature are most exquisite in their forms & rich colours. — It creates a feeling of wonder that so much beauty should be apparently created for such little purpose."