The width of the Strait of Le Maire is about twenty miles. The length of Staten Land is seventy miles.
June 19. We beat against a head wind yesterday, and made but little progress. To-day we had a specimen of Cape Horn weather. A squall arose in the morning, the most violent we have yet encountered; and the sailors were sent in good haste to shorten sail. Assisted by the passengers, they soon reduced the canvass to the proper quantity, and our vessel rode out the storm in fine style, and without any damage. But the captain and two of the passengers lost each a hat. The wind abated in the afternoon.
While the gale was at its height, one of the passengers caught a beautiful black albatross for me. But while the company were looking at it, the captain and mate watched the bird, determined that it should not be killed. I believe they really felt that the safety of the ship depended on the life of the bird. It was a magnificent specimen of this species of albatross, in fact, the only one I ever saw, and would have been a valuable acquisition to me. But I left it for a moment in charge of a friend, when the captain ordered the second mate to bring it to him, and he threw it overboard. Such is the influence of superstition on an ignorant seaman.
June 20. The gale of yesterday subsided at night to a light breeze, which continued during the night, and this morning we had the great gratification of beholding Cape Horn. It lay but a few miles distant, and in full view before us. I felt a slight degree of enthusiasm as I looked upon it, and recalled the descriptions I had read of it in my boyhood, and the tales of terror I had gathered from the narratives of voyages round this far-famed point. We were sailing past the Cape in a south-west direction, with a breeze that was fast increasing in strength, and we hoped that the next tack of our ship would carry us safely beyond the much dreaded barrier. But we soon found that this was not to be so speedily accomplished. The wind rose to a gale, and we were obliged to reduce our canvass to a few sails, and at last to lay to under the foretop-mast-stay sail, main-stay sail and spanker.
Cape Horn is a naked promontory at the extremity of a little island about twelve miles long, called Horn Island. Many other islands and rocks lie in the neighborhood, but Cape Horn is readily distinguished from them all by its greater height and the steepness of its south-western side. It is ninety miles distant from the Strait of Le Maire. Its latitude is 55° 59' south, and its longitude, 67° 16' west.
June 21. We are still encountering head winds, still laying to and drifting to leeward. The wind blows in tempestuous gusts, and the seas are running higher than I have ever before seen them. The sky is covered with clouds, from which we receive frequent showers of rain, accompanied in a single instance, with thunder and lightning. Now and then the sun breaks forth for a moment, but soon disappears again. It is a season of anxiety to many of us, but the bark proves a good sea-boat, and we have considerable confidence in the skill of our captain.
June 22. The gale became furious last night, and seemed increasing in force this morning. We had no little difficulty in eating our breakfast. A pan of fried pork and boiled beef, another pan of hard-bread, and a pot of coffee were set on the table, but how to keep them there required a greater degree of skill than we possessed. We could not sit, and we were in danger every moment of being pitched over the table, and across the cabin. To avoid such a catastrophe we were obliged to hold by the berths with both hands. We made an effort, however, to eat, but had hardly made a beginning when a violent lurch of the ship sent our pork, bread, coffee, and all, in an instant upon the floor and into a neighboring berth. The scene was rather ludicrous, and we managed to extract a laugh out of it as we picked up the fragments, sent for a pot of fresh coffee, and finished our breakfast.