"Every time that I visited the hatchway I observed the water increased, and at noon washed even with the orlop deck; the carpenter assured me the ship could not swim long, and proposed making rafts to float the ship's company, whom it was not in my power to encourage any longer with a prospect of their safety. Some appeared perfectly resigned, went to their hammocks, and desired their messmates to lash them in; others were lashing themselves to gratings and small rafts: but the most predominant idea was that of putting on their best and cleanest clothes.
"The weather, about noon, had been something moderate, and as rafts had been mentioned by the carpenter, I thought it right to make the attempt, though I knew our booms could not float half the ship's company in fine weather; but we were in a situation to catch at a straw. I therefore called the ship's company together, told them my intention, recommending them to remain regular and obedient to their officers. Preparations were immediately made for this purpose; the booms were cleared; the boats, of which we had three, viz., cutter, pinnace, and five-oared yawl, were got over the side; a bag of bread was ordered to be put in each, and any liquors that could be got at, for the purpose of supplying the rafts. I had intended myself to go in the five-oared yawl, and the coxswain was desired to get anything from my steward that might be useful. Two men, captains of the tops of the forecastle, or quarter-masters, were placed in each of them, to prevent any person from forcing the boats or getting into them till an arrangement was made. While these preparations were making, the ship was gradually sinking, the orlop decks having been blown up by the water in the hold, and the cables floated to the gun-deck. The men had for some time quitted their employment of baling, and the ship was left to her fate.
"In the afternoon the weather again threatened, and blew strong in squalls, the sea ran high, and one of the boats (the yawl) was staved alongside and sunk. As the evening approached the ship appeared little more than suspended in water. There was no certainty that she would swim from one minute to another; and the love of life began now to level all distinctions. It was impossible, indeed, for any man to deceive himself with a hope of being saved upon a raft in such a sea; besides that, the ship in sinking, it was probable, would carry everything down with her in a vortex, to a certain destruction.
"It was near five o'clock, when, coming from my cabin, I observed a number of people looking very anxiously over the side, and looking myself, I saw that several men had forced the pinnace and that more were attempting to get in. I had immediate thoughts of securing this boat before she might be sunk by numbers. There appeared not more than a moment for consideration; to remain and perish with the ship's company, to whom I could not be of use any longer, or seize the opportunity, which was the only way of escaping, and leave the people, with whom I had been so well satisfied on a variety of occasions that I thought I could give my life to preserve them—this, indeed, was a painful conflict, such as, I believe, no man can describe, nor any have a just idea of who have not been in a similar situation.
"The love of life prevailed. I called to Mr. Rainy, the master, the only officer upon deck, desired him to follow me, and immediately descended into the boat, at the after-part of the chains; but not without great difficulty got the boat clear of the ship, twice the number that the boat would carry pushing to get in, and many jumping into the water. Mr. Baylis, a young gentleman fifteen years of age, leaped from the chains after the boat had got off, and was taken in. The boat falling astern, became exposed to the sea, and we endeavoured to pull her bow round to keep her to the break of the sea, and to pass to windward of the ship; but in the attempts she was nearly filled, the sea ran too high, and the only probability of living was keeping her before the wind.
"It was then that I became sensible how little, if any, better our condition was than that of those who remained in the ship; at best, it appeared to be only a prolongation of a miserable existence. We were, all together, twelve in number, in a leaky boat, with one of the gunwales staved, in nearly the middle of the Western Ocean, without a compass, without quadrant, without sail, without great-coat or cloak, all very thinly clothed, in a gale of wind, with a great sea running! It was now five o'clock in the evening, and in half an hour we lost sight of the ship. Before it was dark a blanket was discovered in the boat. This was immediately bent to one of the stretchers, and under it, as a sail, we scudded all night, in expectation of being swallowed up by every wave, it being with great difficulty that we could sometimes clear the boat of the water before the return of the next great sea; all of us half drowned, and sitting, except those who baled, at the bottom of the boat; and without having really perished, I am sure no people ever endured more. In the morning the weather grew moderate, the wind having shifted to the southward, as we discovered by the sun. Having survived the night, we began to recollect ourselves, and to think of our future preservation.
"When we quitted the ship the wind was at north-west or north-north-west. Fayal had borne east-south-east two hundred and fifty or two hundred and sixty leagues. Had the wind continued for five or six days, there was a probability that running before the sea we might have fallen in with some of the Western Islands. The change of wind was death to these hopes; for, should it come to blow, we knew there would be no preserving life but by running before the sea, which would carry us again to the northward, where we must soon afterwards perish.
"Upon examining what we had to subsist on, I found a bag of bread, a small ham, a single piece of pork, two quart bottles of water, and a few of French cordials. The wind continued to be southward for eight or nine days, and providentially never blew so strong but that we could keep the side of the boat to the sea; but we were always most miserably wet and cold. We kept a sort of reckoning, but the sun and stars being somewhat hidden from us, for twenty-four hours we had no very correct idea of our navigation. We judged, at this period, that we had made nearly an east-north-east course since the first night's run, which had carried us to the southeast, and expected to see the island of Corvo. In this, however, we were disappointed, and we feared that the southerly wind had driven us far to the northward. Our prayers were now for a northerly wind. Our condition began to be truly miserable, both from hunger and cold; for on the fifth we had discovered that our bread was nearly all spoiled by salt water, and it was necessary to go on allowance. One biscuit divided into twelve morsels for breakfast, and the same for dinner; the neck of a bottle broken off, with the cork in, served for a glass, and this filled with water was the allowance of twenty-four hours for each man. This was done without any sort of partiality or distinction; but we must have perished ere this, had we not caught six quarts of rain water; and this we could not have been blessed with, had we not found in the boat a pair of sheets, which by accident had been put there. These were spread when it rained, and when thoroughly wet wrung into the kid with which we baled the boat. With this short allowance, which was rather tantalising than sustaining in our comfortless condition, we began to grow very feeble, and our clothes being continually wet, our bodies were in many places chafed into sores.
"On the 13th day it fell calm, and soon after a breeze of wind sprang up from the south-south-west and blew to a gale, so that we ran before the sea at the rate of five or six miles an hour under our blanket, till we judged we were to the south ward of Fayal and to the westward sixty leagues; but the wind blowing strong we could not attempt to steer for it. Our wishes were now for the wind to shift to the westward. This was the fifteenth day we had been in the boat, and we had only one day's bread and one bottle of water remaining of a second supply of rain. Our sufferings were now as great as human strength could bear, but we were convinced that good spirits were a better support than any great bodily strength; for on this day Thomas Matthews, quarter-master, the stoutest man in the boat, perished from hunger and cold; on the day before he complained of want of strength in his throat, as he expressed it, to swallow his morsel, and in the night drank salt water, grew delirious and died without a groan. As it became next to a certainty that we should all perish in the same manner in a day or two, it was somewhat comfortable to reflect that dying of hunger was not so dreadful as our imagination had represented. Others had complained of these symptoms in their throats; some had drunk their own urine; and all but myself had drunk salt water.
"As yet despair and gloom had been successfully prohibited; and as the evenings closed in, the men had been encouraged by turns to sing a song, or relate a story, instead of supper; but this evening I found it impossible to raise either. As the night came on it fell calm, and about midnight a breeze of wind sprang up, we guessed from the westward by the swell, but there not being a star to be seen, we were afraid of running out of the way, and waited impatiently for the rising sun to be our compass.