was picked
up. She now began to heel over to port so very much, that the
master-at-arms, sliding overboard, and leaving the scuttle
vacant, we all tried to get up, and I was the last out but
three. The water was then pouring in at the bulk-head
scuttles, yet I succeeded in getting out, and was scarcely in
the sea when I could see nothing above it but the cross-trees,
and nothing around me but a scene of the greatest distress. I
took a plank (being stark-naked) and swam towards an island
about three miles off, but was picked up on my passage by one
of the boats. When we got ashore to the small sandy key, we
found there were thirty-four men drowned, four of whom were
prisoners, and among these was my unfortunate messmate (Mr.
Stewart); ten of us, and eighty-nine of the _Pandora's_ crew,
were saved.

'When a survey was made of what provisions had been saved,
they were found to consist of two or three bags of bread, two
or three breakers of water, and a little wine; so we subsisted
three days upon two wine-glasses of water, and two ounces of
bread per day. On the 1st September we left the island, and on
the 16th, arrived at Coupang in the island of Timor, having
been on short allowance eighteen days. We were put in
confinement in the castle, where we remained till October, and
on the 5th of that month were sent on board a Dutch ship bound
for Batavia.

'Though I have been eight months in close confinement in a hot
climate, I have kept my health in a most surprising manner,
without the least indisposition, and am still perfectly well
in every respect, in mind as well as body; but without a
friend, and only a shirt and pair of trousers to put on, and
carry me home. Yet with all this I have a contented mind,
entirely resigned to the will of Providence, which conduct
alone enables me to soar above the reach of unhappiness.'

In a subsequent letter to his sister he says,
'I send you two little sketches of the manner in which his Majesty's
ship _Pandora_ went down on the 29th August, and of the appearance
which we who survived made on the small sandy key within the reef,
about ninety yards long and sixty broad, in all ninety-nine souls;
here we remained three days, subsisting on a single wine-glass of
wine or water, and two ounces of bre