"The derrick, which was now composed of twenty-two pieces united by a great number of dowels and bolts, thirty-four hoops, and numerous wooldings[[5]] of four-inch ropes, was finished on the evening of the 7th, and the clothing fitted on, and I now had arrived at a point which required much foresight and pre-arrangement, namely, the preparation for erecting it; and it was necessary to weigh with coolness and circumspection the mode by which this was to be done.
"A party of about sixty of our best hands were employed in getting the Lightning's chain and hempen stream cables and large hawsers passed over and around the faces of the cliffs, and the purchases were sufficiently overhauled to admit of their reaching the derrick, and the falls brought to the capstan and crabs, ready for heaving it up. All who are well acquainted with the character and manners of sailors know that it is no easy matter to rid them of their habitual heedlessness. I endeavored to impress them with the need of caution, and the almost universal answer I got was 'Never fear, sir,' which from the fearless and careless manner in which it was expressed, was by no means calculated to remove my apprehensions for their safety.
"The task we had now in hand was one of much danger. The parties working over the cliffs were some of them slung in bights of rope, some supported by man-ropes, some assisting each other by joining hands, and others holding by the uncertain tenure of a tuft of grass or a twig, while loose fragments of rock, being disturbed by the gear and by the men who were working on the upper part, were precipitated amidst those below, while the sharp crags lacerated the hands and feet and rendered dodging these dangers extremely difficult. However, by great attention on the part of the officers, and by promptitude in giving aid when required, this very arduous part of our work was performed, which I sincerely believe could not have been accomplished by any men in the world but British seamen; the only accidents being some cuts in the hands and feet, and bruises from falling stones.
"All the gear being prepared, in the evening I arranged the distribution of my officers with their particular parties at the capstan, crabs, purchases, etc. The smallness of the number of hands sent from the Warspite rendered it necessary that I should have every working man from the Lightning; and on this occasion she was left with only a few convalescents to take care of her, and even the young gentlemen[[6]] were obliged to give their aid at the capstan. On the morning of the 9th, the derrick was launched without casualty, and while the boats were towing it to the cove, all gear was got ready to be attached to it the moment it arrived at the proper position, according to the plan I had given.
"It had to be towed for a distance of about a mile, subject to the influence of a strong current running westward through the gut, at once exposing us to the two-fold danger of being driven to sea or against the rocks. In apprehension of accident from one or the other of these causes, I had taken the precaution of placing bolts at several points of the rocks, so that in case of necessity a warp might be made fast. However, the derrick reached the cove without disaster, and as everything depended on promptitude of action, I had all the gear fitted to go with toggles, which so much facilitated the rigging that in one hour and a half after its arrival, everything was in place and the Lightning's chain stream cable being made fast to the heel of the derrick, ready for heaving up, I left the further management in the cove to Mr. Chatfield, and placed myself upon the main cliff.
"I then gave the order to heave round, and everyone was on the alert; but we had scarcely brought any considerable strain on the gear when a report came to me that the heel of the derrick was displaced and driven into a chasm at the foot of the cliff, an accident which for this time put an end to further efforts. I had no alternative but to cast everything off in a hurry, and if possible return to the harbor with the derrick; but this had become exceedingly doubtful, for the wind was much increased since morning, and the current more rapid. We repeatedly succeeded in towing the derrick into the gut, and were as often driven back; till at length we were compelled to make it fast to the rock outside until a small anchor and some grapnels were laid out, by which means it was finally warped into the harbor, and by half-past eleven at night moored near the Adelaide. Undismayed by this failure, by seven o'clock of the following morning, we were again in the cove with the derrick.
"The vast weight, the great height of the purchases, the number of them, and the great distances they were apart, made united effort impossible, but at the close of the day I had the satisfaction of seeing this huge spar in the place assigned for it, and the head of it hove ten feet above the water. On the 11th, we were again at our purchases, and the head of the derrick was raised to the angle I had intended, being about fifty feet above the surface of the sea.
"During the operation of erecting the derrick, it showed great pliability, the result of being composed of so many pieces, which obliged us to get numerous additional guys on; and having thus secured it, we returned to our encampment, all hands greatly fatigued by three days of the most harassing exertion, from half-past four in the morning until late at night. On looking down from the precipice on this enormous machine, with all its necessary rigging, it became a matter of astonishment to myself, and I believe to everyone else who saw it, that with the small means we had, we could have succeeded in such a situation. It has been my lot to witness many circumstances in which there was cause for great solicitude, but never one wherein such general anxiety was manifested as on this occasion. If any one thing had given way, it must have been fatal to the whole—a general crash would have been inevitable."
Meanwhile, Captain Dickinson had found time to devise a small diving bell, made from another water tank, which could be operated from spars and tackle set up on board a launch. This was employed for exploring the bottom of the cove in order to find where the treasure was. The bell held two men, and there were plenty of volunteers to risk their lives in the first descent in this little iron pot. The trip was disastrous, and the commander described it as follows:
"The water happened to be particularly clear, which gave me an indistinct sight of the bell at the depth of eight fathoms, and I had been watching it with breathless anxiety for a long time, when suddenly a small line of air bubbles rose from about the middle of the hose. I instantly gave the word to the men in the launch to make ready to haul away, but the two men in the bell made no signal to be pulled up. The agitation of the sea became greater every minute, and there was a rise and fall of eight or ten feet of surf against the cliffs. The danger was increasing, and I was about to order the bell to be raised when an immense column of air came bursting up from it. It had been driven violently against the rocks, thrown on its side, and filled with water.