the
Port of New Orleans.

I had at the time no presentiment of disaster. I remember remarking to
the ship's purser, as my things were being carried to my state-room,
that I had never in all my travels entered upon any voyage with so
little premonition of accident. "Very good, Mr. Borus," he answered.
"You will find your state-room in the starboard aisle on the right." I
distinctly recall remarking to the Captain that I had never, in any of
my numerous seafarings, seen the sea of a more limpid blue. He agreed
with me so entirely, as I recollect it, that he did not even trouble to
answer.

Had anyone told me on that bright summer afternoon that our ship would
within a week be wrecked among the Dry Tortugas, I should have laughed.
Had anyone informed me that I should find myself alone on a raft in the
Caribbean Sea, I should have gone into hysterics.

We had hardly entered the waters of the Caribbean when a storm of
unprecedented violence broke upon us. Even the Captain had never, so he
said, seen anything to compare with it. For two days and nights we
encountered and endured the full fury of the sea. Our soup plates were
secured with racks and covered with lids. In the smoking-room our
glasses had to be set in brackets, and as our steward came and went, we
were from moment to moment in imminent danger of seeing him washed
overboard.

On the third morning just after daybreak the ship collided with
something, probably either a floating rock or one of the dry Tortugas.
She blew out her four funnels, the bowsprit dropped out of its place,
and the propeller came right off. The Captain, after a brief
consultation, decided to abandon her. The boats were lowered, and, the
sea being now quite calm, the passengers were emptied into them.

By what accident I was left behind I cannot tell. I had been talking to
the second mate and telling him of a rather similar experience of mine
in the China Sea, and holding him by the coat as I did so, when quite
suddenly he took me by the shoulders, and rushing me into the deserted
smoking-room said, "Sit there, Mr. Borus, till I come back for you." The
fellow spoke in such a menacing way that I thought it wiser to comply.

When I came out they were all gone. By good fortune I found one of the
ship's rafts still lying on the deck. I gathered together such articles
as might be of use and contrived, though how I do not know, to launch it
into the sea.

On my second morning on my raft I was