On this captain Mitchel made signals of distress, and our long-boat
was sent to him with a store of water and plenty of fish and other
refreshments; and the long-boat being not to be spared, the coxswain had
positive orders from the Commodore to return again immediately; but the
weather proving stormy the next day, and the boat not appearing, we much
feared she was lost, which would have proved an irretrievable misfortune
to us all. But the third day after we were relieved from this anxiety by
the joyful sight of the long-boat's sails upon the water, and we sent the
cutter immediately to her assistance, which towed her alongside in a few
hours. The crew of our long-boat had taken in six of the Gloucester's
sick men to bring them on shore, two of whom had died in the boat. And
now we learned that the Gloucester was in a most dreadful condition,
having scarcely a man in health on board, except those they received from
us; and numbers of their sick dying daily, we found that, had it not been
for the last supply sent by our long-boat, both the healthy and diseased
must have all perished together for want of water. And these calamities
were the more terrifying, as they appeared to be without remedy, for the
Gloucester had already spent a month in her endeavours to fetch the bay,
and she was now no farther advanced than at the first moment she made the
island; on the contrary, the people on board her had worn out all their
hopes of ever succeeding in it by the many experiments they had made of
its difficulty.
Pages:
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74