We required a moving and ruling spirit, and Joe took that place.
By his orders we utilised the preserved meat-tins as cooking vessels, and by partaking of certain coarse herbs and wild grasses, boiled therein, we averted all danger of scurvy.
For fuel we had at first the broken driftwood that came from the wreck; but this was soon, with all our care, expended, and the cold would perhaps have destroyed us, had not the indefatigable Joe discovered that we could make fires of the bones and skins of the seafowl; and Joe, who was a well-read Scotsman, told us all how Dr. Livingstone once fed the fires of his steam-boat on the Rovuma River with elephants' ribs.
The success of our plan, to feed fires with the legs of albatrosses, gulls, and kittiwakes, for the many months that we did, proves the vast number we must have caught; but weary indeed were we of this daily menu of eggs and oily sea-bird flesh, seasoned with salt obtained from the surf where it dried on the rocks.
I shall never forget the great horror that fell on us, when one of our little band died of a fatal gangrene, having injured his foot by a fall; and as we buried him in the sea came the dread question, if we were all fated to perish in succession, who among us would be the last and lonely man upon that rocky isle?
Save for the lucky accident that several among us had match-boxes in their pockets when quitting the wreck, we could never have lighted a fire! As the ship broke up, various things came ashore; among others, a passenger's chest, wherein we found some blankets, knives, and spoons.
So passed away August and September, and all this dreary time, a keen look-out was kept from the first break of dawn to the last glimpse of sunset for any passing sail, as life depended upon rescue. We often marvelled whether any vessel ever passed in the night, as we had no fiery beacon to attract attention.
Finding themselves preyed upon, the sea-birds became wilder, and food grew scarce. It is easy to imagine the agony in which, with haggard eyes and wildly beating hearts, we twice saw the sails of passing ships; but they were 'hull down,' at a vast distance, and could not see our despairing signals.
At length there came a day—oh, never, never shall I or any who were with me then forget it!
The morning broke warm, fine, and sunny, and a shout came from the watch at the beacon, that 'a ship was close in shore!'