eceived
on board the _Caroline_, from Captain Bibbey, who considerately remained
till daylight close to the wreck, in the hope that some others might
still be found clinging to it--an act of humanity which, it will appear
on the slightest reflection, would have been madness in Captain Cook, in
the peculiar situation of the _Cambria_, to have attempted.

But when I recollect the lamentable state of exhaustion to which that
portion of the crew were reduced, who unshrinkingly performed to the
last their arduous and perilous duties,--and that out of the three boats
that remained afloat, one was only prevented from sinking, towards the
close of the night, by having the hole in its bottom repeatedly stuffed
with soldiers' jackets, while the other two were rendered inefficient,
the one by having its bow completely stove, and the second by being half
filled with water, and the thwarts so torn as to make it necessary to
lash the oars to the boat's ribs,--I must believe that, by those who
thus laboured, all was done that humanity could possibly demand, or
intrepidity effect, for the preservation of every individual.

Quitting, for a moment, the subject of the wreck, I would advert to what
was in the meantime taking place on board the _Cambria_. I cannot,
however, pretend to give you any adequate idea of the feelings of hope
or despair that alternately flowed, like a tide, in the breasts of the
unhappy females on board the brig, during the many hours of torturing
suspense in which several of them were unavoidably held respecting the
fate of their husbands,--feelings which were inconceivably excited,
rather than soothed, by the idle and erroneous rumours occasionally
conveyed to them regarding the state of the _Kent_. But still less can I
attempt to portray the alternate pictures of awful joy and of wild
distraction exhibited by the sufferers (for both parties for the moment
seemed equally to suffer), as the terrible truth was communicated that
they and their children were indeed left husbandless and fatherless;
or as the objects from whom they had feared they were for ever severed,
suddenly rushed into their arms. But these feelings of delight, whatever
may have been their intensity, were speedily chastened, and the
attention of all arrested, by the last tremendous spectacle of
destruction.

After the arrival of the last boat the flames, which had spread along
the upper deck and poop, ascended with the rapidity of lightning to t