medicine._" I found the flask;
the _water_ had not injured it. A small quantity was taken, when a most
favorable change came over my entire system, mental as well as physical,
and I was able to throw off one suit and put on another in the icy wind,
that might, without the stimulant, have ended my voyage of life.

I had doctored myself homoeopathically under the _old practice_.
Filled with feelings of gratitude to the Great Giver of good, I
reflected, as I carried my wet cargo into the marsh, upon the wonderful
effects of my friend's medicine when taken _only as medicine_. Standing
upon the cold beach and gazing into the sea, now lashed by the wild
frenzy of the wind, I determined never again to do so mean a thing as to
say a _bad_ word against _good_ brandy.

Having relieved my conscience by this just resolve, I transported the
whole of my wet but still precious cargo to a persimmon grove, on a spot
of firm land that rose out of the marsh, where I made a convenient
wind-break by stretching rubber blankets between trees. On this knoll I
built a fire, obtaining the matches to kindle it from a water-proof safe
presented to me by Mr. Epes Sargent, of Boston, some years before, when
I was ascending the St. Johns River, Florida.

Before dusk, all things not spoiled by the water were dried and secreted
in the tall sedge of the marshes. The elevation which had given me
friendly shelter is known as "Hog Island." The few persimmon-trees that
grew upon it furnished an ample lunch, for the frosts had mellowed the
plum-like fruit, making it sweet and edible. The persimmon (_Diospyrus
Virginiana_) is a small tree usually found in the middle and southern
states. Coons and other animals feast upon its fruit. The deepening
gloom warned me to seek comfortable quarters for the night.

Two miles up the strand was an old gunners' inn, to which I bent my
steps along Slaughter Beach, praying that one more day's effort would
take me out of this bleak region of ominous names. A pleasant old
gentleman, Mr. Charles Todd, kept the tavern, known as Willow Grove
Hotel, more for amusement than for profit. I said nothing to him about
the peculiar manner in which I had landed on Slaughter Beach; but to his
inquiry as to where my boat was, and what kind of a boat it was to live
in such a blow, I replied that I found it too wet and cold on the bay to
remain there, and too rough to proceed to Cape Henlopen, and there being
no alternative, I was oblige