d those with him, we could not help feeling anxious for
his return. An hour of darkness passed away, and then another and
another, and still the whale-boat did not appear. She had gone, I ought
to have said, on the lee side of the raft; but the wind was light, so
that she could have had no difficulty in pulling up to it. No one this
night felt inclined to go to sleep. We were all too anxious about our
companions. I saw Mr Merton turning his eyes with a steady gaze away
to the south-east. I looked in the same direction. Gradually I saw
emerging out of the darkness an opaque, towering mass. At first I
thought it was a mere mark in the clouds, and then it resolved itself
into the form of a tall ship close-hauled under all canvas. A shout
from the boats showed that they had discovered the stranger. Again we
shouted, and a cheer came up from her to show us that we were seen and
heard. In a few minutes she hove-to, and our own whale-boat appeared
from alongside her, accompanied by another boat. The mate explained, as
he made a tow-rope fast to the raft to tow us alongside the ship, that
he had seen her just before nightfall, and by pulling away to the
southward had happily succeeded in cutting her off.

We soon found ourselves on board a large ship, the _Happy Relief_--and a
happy relief she was to us--bound homeward from Honduras with logwood.
They were a rough set on board, from the master to the apprentices, but
they treated us kindly, as most sailors treat others in distress, and we
had every reason to be grateful to them. We had still greater reason to
be thankful that we got on board their ship that night, for before the
morning a gale began to blow, and a heavy sea soon got up, which would
have swept us all off the raft, and in all probability swamped the
boats. It continued blowing for several days. The ship laboured very
much, and soon all hands were called to the pumps. She had proved a
fortunate ship to us, and it was a fortunate circumstance for her that
she had fallen in with us; for all hands had to keep spell and spell at
the pumps, and even so we were only just able to keep the leaks under.
Had she not had us on board, she would very soon, I suspect, have been
water-logged. At length the gale abated, but we notwithstanding, had to
keep the pumps going night and day. By the time we reached the Chops of
the Channel, having a fair breeze, we were looking out every instant to
make the land, when a