it lay over the starboard bow; and the topmast floated
ahead of the hull, held by the gear. Many feet of bulwarks were crushed
level; the pumps had vanished; the caboose was gone! A completer
nautical ruin I had never viewed.

One extraordinary stroke I quickly detected. The jolly-boat had lain
stowed in the long-boat; it was thus we carried those boats, the little
one lying snugly enough in the other. The sea that had flooded our decks
had floated the jolly-boat out of the long-boat, and swept it bottom up
to the gangway where it lay, as though God's mercy designed it should be
preserved for my use; for, not long after it had been floated out, the
brig struck the berg, the masts fell--and there lay the long-boat
crushed into staves!

This signal and surprising intervention filled my heart with
thankfulness, though my spirits sank again at the sight of my poor
drowned shipmates. But, unless I had a mind to join them, it was
necessary I should speedily bestir myself. So after a minute's
reflection I whipped out my knife, and cutting a couple of blocks away
from the raffle on deck, I rove a line through them, and so made a
tackle, by the help of which I turned the jolly-boat over; I then with a
handspike prised her nose to the gangway, secured a bunch of rope on
either side her to act as fenders or buffers when she should be launched
and lying alongside, ran her midway out by the tackle, and, attaching a
line to a ring-bolt in her bow, shoved her over the side, and she fell
with a splash, shipping scarce a hatful of water.

I found her mast and sail--the sail furled to the mast, as it was used
to lie in her--close against the stump of the mainmast; but though I
sought with all the diligence that hurry would permit for her rudder, I
nowhere saw it, but I met with an oar that had belonged to the other
boat, and this with the mast and sail I dropped into her, the swell
lifting her up to my hand when the blue fold swung past.

My next business was to victual her. I ran to the cabin, but the
lazarette was full of water, and none of the provisions in it to be come
at. I thereupon ransacked the cabin, and found a whole Dutch cheese, a
piece of raw pork, half a ham, eight or ten biscuits, some candles, a
tinder-box, several lemons, a little bag of flower, and thirteen bottles
of beer. These things I rolled up in a cloth and placed them in the
boat, then took from the captain's locker four jars of spirits, two of
which I empti