ahead of the ship, had worked round and lay between the ship and the shore. It now became an object to ascertain where we were, and how to get away. Should any one hereafter feel interested in reading this narrative, it would without doubt be desirable to have a description of this place; I shall therefore attempt to give as clear a description as I can.

We were on the eastern side of Cape St. Mary's, perhaps ten miles from the pitch, or head of the cape. Our station was against the side of a mountain whose perpendicular height was perhaps five or six hundred feet, and generally so steep and abounding with breaks and precipices, that it was very difficult for a man to ascend it in any place, and in some places it was utterly impracticable. The shore in general very bold; and it is what sailors generally call an iron bound shore. In some places the rocks were almost perpendicular, ten, twenty, and sometimes forty feet high. The reef on which our ship stuck fast, appears to me to have slid out of the mountain, some hundred years ago. It might have been at the time when the adorable Jesus hung upon the cross.

At half tide and in fair weather, the tops of the rocks on this reef were bare, and it extended ten or twelve rods into the sea where it came to a point, and in the base of this reef by the shore was five or six rods wide, and formed a pleasant beach. The shore in this place was a little indented. If our ship had been two rods further from the shore she must have passed without this reef, and in that case, have fallen directly on a lee shore, where she must have gone to pieces in a very little time, in a place where it would have been impossible for one soul to have landed. Nothing excited more astonishment than to comprehend how it was, that the two men who first jumped on the rocks, got from that place to the beach.

At about 8 or 9 o'clock, some men got on the wreck, and soon after I went on myself, but did not perceive much difference in appearance, since the time I left her but when the tide went fully down, I went into the hold, which was entirely empty. Every cask, all her ballast, and every other article was washed out, and in some

places were very large chasms. The arm chest on the weather side of the quarter deck, remained unhurt. There was found in one of the state rooms, about two hundred pounds of bread, unhurt; and in the harness cask, under the forecastle, there was about two hundred pounds of meat, principally pork.

After we had eaten some bread and raw meat, a company of five or six men was selected, and furnished with an iron bar or two, which were found in the beckets, and some small rigging, and directed to endeavor to find their way up the mountain. In a zig zag direction they reached the summit, and then came down as far as they could with safety, stuck the crowbar into the ground and made fast a rope to it, and then descended by the rope; making one rope fast to another until they got down. In the arm chest before mentioned, there were a number of muskets, some ammunition, tomahawks, cutlasses, &c. In the sailors' hammocks, which hung under the gun deck, were found a number of blankets, so that every man could be furnished with one; and all the provisions having been got on shore, every man took some, and all hands prepared to ascend the mountain. There was neither tree nor shrub to be seen.

Mr. Baggs, whose counsel had been despised an hour before the ship struck, was now held in high estimation, and looked up to even by the Captain. That gentleman's name was Samuel Marsh, a man of respectability; he was not on deck when Baggs was treated ill, and it was said that the officers on deck, altered the ship's course without his knowledge.

It was said that the ship's crew consisted of about 170, besides five prisoners. I do not recollect exactly the number which were lost; it was I think short of twenty. Some I believe were so presumptuous as to attempt swim to shore and were lost. There was one woman on board, she was the cook's wife, and was saved without injury; a traveller being fixed on the great rope, she was drawn on shore in haste.

Some of the ship's sails were got on shore, and a tent erected for her accommodation. Her husband, one of the surgeon's mates, and several others were left in this place. This woman was delivered of a child in a day or

two after, and in a few days they were all taken off by some fishing shallops.

It was perhaps one or two o'clock when we began to ascend the mountain. In going up this mountain, I had ascended a precipice fifteen or twenty feet, and had got on eight or ten yards, where the ground was so steep that I could not walk without holding on by the rope.— Some one having jerked the rope out of my hands, I fell on my face, and was sliding fast down, and had got within twice my length of the edge of the precipice; a sailor who had just got up, clapped his foot upon me, and held me until I got hold of the rope again. Had I fallen off these rocks, it would probably have killed me.

When I reached the summit of the mountain, I found myself on the border of a spacious plain. Looking northerly and westerly, a man might be seen a mile off.

Not a tree or shrub could be seen. In a southern direction within a mile and a half, was a wilderness of evergreens, The surface of the ground was covered with a long thick moss, in which our feet would sink six inches at every step.

In looking down on the ship, she did not appear bigger than a long boat. We took up our march for the wood, our company something like a hundred and fifty. It was about sunset when we got to the woods. We tried to make some fire but had poor luck; there was no dry fuel to be had; the recent heavy rain had wet every thing, and it was very difficult to make a fire of green spruce and fir. We gathered boughs for our beds, for although the moss was soft, it was very wet and cold. We stowed pretty close together, and covered ourselves with our blankets, yet we were very uncomfortable, for our clothes had scarcely got dry, and it was a frosty night.

In the morning, the Captain and other officers had a long consultation with Mr. Baggs, respecting the route we should pursue. We were something like a hundred miles from Placentia, but I do not know what was the distance to St. Johns. It was concluded to shape our course for Placentia. On the next morning, orders were given to have all the provisions collected together and

each one, both officers and men, were to receive an equal allowance.

It was thought necessary to remain where we were that day, in order that Mr. Baggs might examine the coast, for the purpose of settling some question in his own mind. Mr. Baggs and several others set off and on their return in the evening, brought the unpleasant intelligence that the vessel which we had chased had gone entirely to pieces, and it was presumed that every soul was lost. On the morning following, we took up our march and kept along in the woods, until past noon; we then came upon the sea shore on the head of a bay called by Mr. Baggs, Distress bay. He told us that for the space of two or three leagues off, the water was not more than two fathoms deep, and that this bay abounded with rocks under water.

It was supposed that this vesael must have gone entirely to pieces, several miles from the shore. We supposed her to have been a brig, and we knew her to have been an American built, for on the forehead of some of her carved images, the letters U. S. A. were carved. She might have been captured by the English, and in their service. There was no doubt but that she had been to the West Indies, for we found several hogsheads of rum upon the shore, and some of them not much injured. The officers with tomahawks cut holes in those casks, and poured all the rum out, lest the sailors should be tempted to linger behind for the sake of the rum. No man was allowed to drink a drop, nor did the officers take any. The remains of this vessel were scattered a mile or more on the shore. We picked up fourteen men and a boy about twelve or fourteen years old. We dragged them up on the bank, (for the shore here was low,) and with staves dug a grave two or three feet deep, and buried them as decently as in our circumstances we could.

The only provision we found was a lump of butter; it had been in a keg, but that was stove to pieces and the sand was beat into the butter several inches. This part which was so damaged was scraped off, and the good we took along with us. We spent several hours about

this wreck. The largest piece that we found was three or four planks of her quarter deck, with two or three of the timbers. We kept along the shore several miles; found the travelling very bad. At length we were obliged to take to the woods again in consequence of the boldness of the shore.

I have been accustomed to the wilderness in New England, New-York, Pennsylvania and Ohio, but have never seen any so difficult to get through as that of Newfoundland. Three times a day Capt. Marsh would set down with the bread bag between his legs, and deal out to each man a small quantity of bread, and some other officer would distribute a small quantity of meat; the butter was also divided, which we found on the sea shore. I should say that the whole amount of provisions a day, to each man, did not exceed eight ounces. I think it was on the eighth or ninth day, when we arrived at a little port, Point Var. Some few of our company were so exhausted, that they were left by the way, and whether they were ever relieved, I am unable to say.

We were driven into store houses, and furnished with a kind of tea, which they called Labrador tea; this was well sweetened with molasses. This tea with ship bread composed our supper, but before the officers with the men of the place had got us housed, we had made free with some of the fish from the beach; this however was taken away as we entered the store house. I had the good luck or the presumption to conceal a small one under my jacket, and I found that others had done the same. I reserved as much for myself as I dared to eat, and distributed the remainder to others. They gave us a plenty of tea. I took Wilds for my messmate, got under a large bench, and we ate our supper with great caution and comfort, being very careful to masticate our fish thoroughly, and to eat and drink very slowly. We were, probably an hour in eating our suppers, and we then had a dry floor to repose on, and had a comfortable night's

rest.

The next day we had to walk four or five miles to Placentia, and we who were prisoners were deposited in our old station, the guard house. A Mr. Sanders,