at noon, and saw the land to the westward, our
position being then 20 miles south of Point Torment. The water had
shoaled in several places during the passage to less than a fathom
(low-water); but the tide hemmed in by the contraction of this great
inlet (the left shore of which gradually trending to the eastward, here
approached to within six miles of the opposite coast) still hurried us on
with a rapidity agreeable enough but not quite free from danger, towards
what appeared to be the mouth of a large river. If our exultation had
been great in the morning, when such success as this was only half
anticipated, what was it at that exciting moment when the eventful hour
which should give us the triumph of such a discovery as that we now
fairly anticipated, seemed within our grasp? I cannot answer for others,
but for myself I had never known a sensation of greater delight. Doubt,
disappointment, difficulty, and danger; all, all were unheeded or
forgotten in the one proud thought that for us was reserved an enterprise
the ultimate results of which might in some future year affect the
interests of a great portion of the world! Presently, as if to recall to
their routine of duty, these upward-springing thoughts, the boats were
found to be rapidly carried by the stream towards an extensive flat,
which appeared to extend right across the opening towards which all eyes
had been turned with so much eagerness, and over which the tide was
boiling and whirling with great force. To attempt to cross would have
been madness; there was nothing, therefore, to be done but patiently
await the rising of the tide.

ESCAPE POINT.

The nearest land, a mangrove point bearing South-South-East one mile, we
afterwards named Escape Point, in grateful memory of the providential
escapes we experienced in its vicinity. Where the boats were anchored we
had nearly five feet at low-water, and the tide ran past them at the rate
of five miles an hour. As soon as possible we again started, in a south
by west direction, and proceeded for about five miles, when the boats
were anchored, near the western shore, which we proposed to visit at
low-water. From the yawl's masthead I traced the shore all round, except
to the south-east, where I could see an opening about a mile wide. The
western land was slightly elevated, perhaps to 70 feet, and clothed with
rather large trees, while to the eastward the land appeared very low. As
the tide ebbed, we found, to our d