At the end of her second voyage Bully Forbes left the Marco Polo to take over the Lightning, and was succeeded by his chief mate Charles McDonald.
Leaving Liverpool in November, 1853, with 666 passengers, McDonald took her out in 72 days 12 hours or 69 days land to land, and brought her home in 78 days. Then he left her to take over the James Baines and a Captain W. Wild had her. By this time it is probable that she was getting pretty badly strained, being a soft-wood ship, and whether Captain Wild and his successor Captain Clarke were not sail carriers or did not like to press her too much, I do not know, but her fourth and fifth voyages were not specially good, her times being:—
4th voyage, 1854-5, outward 95 days, under Captain Wild.
homeward 85 days, under Captain Wild.
5th voyage, 1855, outward 81 days, under Captain Clarke.
homeward 86 days, under Captain Clarke.
She was still, however, a favourite ship, taking 520 passengers out and bringing home 125,000 ounces of gold under Captain Clarke.
On her sixth voyage she for the first time got into trouble as she parted her tow rope when leaving the Mersey and got aground off the Huskisson Dock, after first colliding with a barque at anchor in the river. However she came off on the flood without damage and sailed for Melbourne on 7th December, 1855, arriving out on 26th February, an 83-day passage. In 1856 she went out in 89 days, leaving Liverpool 5th September.
Her most serious mishap was on her passage home in 1861, when she collided with an iceberg on 4th March. Her bowsprit was carried away, bow stove in and foremast sprung; in fact, so seriously was she damaged that she was very near being abandoned. Eventually, however, she managed to struggle into Valparaiso after a month of incessant pumping. Here she was repaired and, continuing her voyage, at length arrived at Liverpool on 21st August, 183 days out from Melbourne.
Though Messrs. James Baines sold her to another Liverpool firm in the early sixties, she still continued regularly in the Melbourne trade, and as late as 1867 I find another fine passage to her account, which is thus described by Captain Coates in his Good Old Days of Shipping:—“Captain Labbet, of Brisbane, once told me that in January, 1867, he took passage home in the steamship Great Britain. The Marco Polo left at the same time and was soon lost sight of. A week later the look-out man of the Great Britain reported a sail right ahead, and shortly afterwards expressed his belief that it was the Marco Polo, in which ship he had previously sailed. His opinion, however, was scoffed at; on the ship being neared he proved to have been right. She was again distanced and the Great Britain made what was esteemed a good passage. On taking the pilot off Cork, the first question asked was:—“Have you seen the Marco Polo?” The reply came:—“Yes, she passed up 8 days ago.” She had made the passage in 76 days.