[65] According to Lord Macartney, the tide rises at full and new moon, between 8 and 9 feet perpendicular. A northerly wind always causes the highest tide, the current of which is from S.E. by S. to N.W. by N., and has a velocity of about 3 miles an hour.
The proper carrying out of the objects of the geognostic enquiries was hampered by unforeseen obstacles and difficulties. One day the rain would be so heavy, that the slight covering of our apartments would be insufficient to protect us any longer from the beating of the rain which fell in bucketsfull, and began to leak through innumerable seams and cracks on to the beds, tables, and floor. Did any one think to shelter himself in the hut of a neighbour?—ere long there commenced a regular emigration, which very speedily came to a conclusion, by each and all having the melancholy satisfaction of perceiving that Fortune had set to work with rigorous impartiality, and had resolved to let each one of us feel the weight of her displeasure. And so we passed the long dreary hours in our comfortless huts, that gave free entrance to wind and rain, with umbrellas outspread or wrapped in our India-rubber cloaks, gazing moodily at the numerous cases full of valuable instruments, which, instead of being serviceable to science, were, by the loss of so many splendid opportunities, doomed to inactivity.
RAINY DAY AT ST. PAUL.
Fortunately, all showed themselves animated by the utmost zeal for the undertaking and its successful issue; and, in a word, each fresh avalanche of difficulties, which sought to thwart our exertions and impair our forces, served only to reawaken the energies and reanimate the confidence of each and all amid all our calamities.
So soon as the hovel we inhabited, which had enabled us to make observations upon the direction and strength of the wind rather than secured us any accommodation for sleep, had been in some degree restored to its original condition, we availed ourselves of the slight improvement in the weather, to examine a tolerably numerous collection of very beautifully bound books, which were found stowed away in one of the recesses for books running into the four partitions, and had in all probability much to dread from the rain-water trickling through the covering of the roof. These had been brought hither by a former proprietor of the island, and when it was sold were transferred with the rest of the stock of tools, &c., to M. Ottovan, who occasionally resided at St. Paul for a month or two, but seemed, so far as the condition of the books went, rarely to meddle with them. It was curious enough, however, to encounter in a lone desert island, so many evidences of the most refined civilization, so we shall cite in a note some of the most interesting of this library of about 150 different works, which deserved a better fate than to moulder away undisturbed till they fell into dust.[66]
[66] Among these were the works on Natural History, by Charles Bonnel (Neufchâtel, 1783); J. S. Laharpe's "Abrégé de l'Histoire Générale des Voyages, Paris, 1816;" Dacier's "Translation of Horace into French, with Notes and Critical Remarks. Paris, 1816;" "De la Félicité Publique; ou, Considérations sur le sort des Hommes dans les Différentes époques de l'Histoire: A. Bouillon: from the Printing Establishment of the Typographical Society, Paris, 1776;" "Essay on the Life of the Great Condé, by Louis Joseph, Prince de Condé, at present in England, London, 1st May, 1807;" "Précis des Journées 15, 16, 17, and 18 Juin, 1815, ou Fin de la Vie Politique de Napoleon Buonaparte, par M. Giraud, auteur de la "Campagne de Paris en 1814;" Paris, 1815, 1st vol. 8; "Histoire des Guerres des Gaulois et des Français en Italie, avec le tableau des évènemens civils et mílitaires qui les accompagnèrent et leur influence sur la civilisation et les progrès de l'esprit humain." "Depuis Bellevise jusqu'à la mort de Louis XII., par lex Adjutant-Général Auguste Jubé, tribun." "Depuis Louis XII., jusqu'àu Traité d'Amiens, par Joseph Servan, Général de Division. Dediées à S. M. l'Empereur. Paris, an. XIII. (1805)." "Manuel des habitans de St. Dominique, contenant un précis de l'histoire de cette isle depuis sa découverte, etc., par S. J. Ducœurjoly, ancien habitant de St. Dominique; Paris, 1800, an. X, 2 vols.
Less fortunate were we in our researches for any document which could in any way throw any light, direct or indirect, upon the former history of St. Paul. The only piece of writing which we found that had reference to the island, was a licence drawn up during the reign of Louis Philippe, dated 20th February, 1846, to M. Adam, of St. Denis (in the Island of Bourbon), to proceed to carry out a certain undertaking in the schooner "La Mouche," 30 tons' burthen, under the protection of the French flag. "La Mouche," is the same boat in which Viot had made so many voyages to and fro between St. Denis and St. Paul. This document, which the poor old Frenchman drew out one evening from a drawer thickly strewn with dust, insensibly led the conversation to the quondam owners of St. Paul, and thence naturally to an enquiry, on our part, as to the number of graves which dotted this romantic offshoot of Père la Chaise. "The climate is far too healthy, and the island far too little frequented, to admit of there being many graves in St. Paul," replied Viot. Of the blacks, whom M. Adam had once worked so unmercifully on the island, very many perished here owing to the severity of their treatment, but no one knows where their bodies lie;—very possibly their bones lie scattered about the island, like the remains of the much persecuted petrel (prion turton), which the predatory gull throws carelessly from him after he has stripped off the flesh, and gorged himself on the most delicate morsels. Only two graves are known to the present residents,—one is the resting-place of an Englishwoman, who died on board a merchant-ship which happened to be near the island, and whose grave was dug in the earth on the north side of the crater-basin; the second covers the body of a ship captain, who was accidentally drowned in the basin by the upsetting of a small boat, as he was approaching the bar in heavy weather. His grave is at a short distance behind the huts of the colonists, and bears traces to this day of the solemn feelings with which it was erected; an enclosure of large stones neatly arranged, make the site and its object at once recognisable.
Shipwrecks are unheard of at St. Paul; at least, none such have been known to occur since it has been occupied by man. On the other hand, they are of more frequent occurrence at the sister island, as has very lately been evidenced by the catastrophe of the Meridian. However, the elements are not always to blame for such lamentable occurrences. Ships are sometimes dashed to pieces on the shores of Amsterdam in the finest weather, so that one is almost induced to believe that these misfortunes are occasionally resorted to intentionally, so as to realize some high insurance on a vessel which has probably already become half unseaworthy—a not very conscientious method of doing business, of which, however, some of the natives of Greece and the borders thereof are not unfrequently guilty. In February, 1855, a North American whaler struck upon the north-east side of Amsterdam in a calm, and with a clear sky overhead, so that the entire crew, 30 in number, were able to secure the provisions and their kits. The captain, with one of the ship's small boats, made for the Island of St. Paul, 42 miles distant, in the hope, probably, of getting assistance thence. A lucky destiny so willed it, that (the accident having occurred in the finest season of the year), a vessel of M. Ottovan's, which by a strange coincidence was named L'Ange Gardien (the Guardian Angel), lay at anchor inside the crater-basin, loading with fish. The shipwrecked crew were indebted to his circumstance that, within 14 days more, they found themselves at Mauritius. A report circulated among the residents of St. Paul that the captain of the stranded ship had landed with some of his companions in a boat on the N.E. of Amsterdam, with the intention of searching for a sum of several thousand dollars which a previous visitant to this island was said to have buried there for some mysterious reasons. While the captain was on shore, vainly searching for a considerable time after the buried treasure, the shipmaster left in charge in his absence came too near the island, whereupon the vessel had been lost upon one of the numerous reefs which lie off the shore. A part, it was added, of the buried money had, in fact, been recovered. According to Viot, the captain had dug up 1000 dollars (above £200), and one of his companions 300 dollars.