THE ALABAMA ON THE INDIAN OCEAN--THE PASSENGERS QUESTIONED, AND CONTRACTED
WITH--THE AGULHAS CURRENT--THE "BRAVE WEST WINDS"--A THEORY--THE ISLANDS
OF ST. PETER AND ST. PAUL--THE TROPIC OF CAPRICORN--THE SOUTH-EAST TRADES
AND THE MONSOONS--THE ALABAMA ARRIVES OFF THE STRAIT OF SUNDA, AND BURNS
ONE OF THE SHIPS OF THE ENEMY--RUNS IN AND ANCHORS UNDER THE ISLAND OF
SUMATRA.
When Bartelli awakened me, at the usual hour of "seven bells"--half-past
seven A. M.,--on the morning after the events described in the last
chapter, the _Alabama_ was well launched upon the Indian Ocean. She had
run the Cape of Good Hope out of sight, and was still hieing off before
the gale, though this had moderated considerably as she had run off the
coast. We were now about to make a long voyage, tedious to the
unphilosophical mariner, but full of interest to one who has an eye open
to the wonders and beauties of nature. My first duty, upon going on deck,
was to put the ship under sail, and let the steam go down; and my second,
to have an interview with the "passengers," who had come on board,
overnight. We were now on the high seas, and might, with all due respect
to Queen Victoria, put them under contract. If the reader recollects
Falstaff's description of his ragged battalion, he will have a pretty good
idea of the _personnel_ I had before me. These subjects of the Queen stood
in all they possessed. None of them had brought any baggage on board with
them. Ragged blue and red flannel shirts, tarred trousers, and a mixture
of felt hats and Scotch caps, composed their wardrobe. Their persons had
passed muster of the surgeon, it is true, but it was plain that it would
require a deal of washing and scrubbing and wholesome feeding, and a long
abstinence from "drinks," to render them fit for use. Upon questioning
them, I found that each had his cock-and-a-bull story to tell, of how he
was "left" by this ship, or by that, without any fault of his own, and how
he had been tricked by his landlord. I turned them over to the first
lieutenant, and paymaster, and they were soon incorporated with the crew.
I hold that her Majesty owes me some "boot," for the "swap" I made with
her, on that remarkable moonlight night when I left the Cape. At all
events, I never heard that she complained of it.
I was grieved to find that our most serious loss among the deserters, was
our Irish fiddler. This fellow had been remarkably diligent, in his
vocation, and had fiddled the crew over half the world. It was a pity to
lose him, now that we were going over the other half. When the evening's
amusements began, Michael Mahoney's vacant camp-stool cast a gloom over
the ship. There was no one who could make his violin "talk" like himself,
and it was a long time before his place was supplied. Poor Michael! we
felt convinced he had not been untrue to us--it was only a "dhrop" too
much of the "crayture" he had taken.
For the first few days after leaving the Cape, we ran off due south, it
being my intention to seek the fortieth parallel of south latitude, and
run my easting down on that parallel. As icebergs have been known to make
their appearance near the Cape in the spring of the year, I ordered the
temperature of the air and water to be taken every hour during the night,
to aid me in detecting their presence. We did not discover any icebergs,
but the thermometer helped to reveal to me some of the secrets of the
deep, in this part of the ocean. Much to my surprise, I found myself in a
sort of Gulf Stream; the temperature of the water being from three to five
degrees higher, than that of the air. My celestial observations for fixing
the position of the ship, informed me at the same time that I was
experiencing a south-easterly current; the current bending more and more
toward the east, as I proceeded south, until in the parallel of 40 deg.,
it ran due east. The rate of this current was from thirty to fifty miles
per day. This was undoubtedly a branch of the great Agulhas current.
If the reader will inspect a map, he will find that the North Indian Ocean
is bounded wholly by tropical countries--Hindostan, Beloochistan, and
Arabia to the Red Sea, and across that sea, by Azan and Zanguebar. The
waters in this great bight of the ocean are intensely heated by the fervor
of an Indian and African sun, and flow off in quest of cooler regions
through the Mozambique Channel. Passing thence over the Agulhas Bank,
which lies a short distance to the eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, they
reach that Cape, as the Agulhas current. Here it divides into two main
prongs or branches; one prong pursuing a westerly course, and joining in
with the great equatorial current, which, the reader recollects, we
encountered off Fernando de Noronha, and the other bending sharply to the
south-east, and forming the Gulf Stream of the South Indian Ocean, in
which the _Alabama_ is at present. What it is, that gives this latter
prong its sudden deflection to the southward is not well understood.
Probably it is influenced, to some extent, by the southerly current,
running at the rate of about a knot an hour along the west coast of
Africa, and debouching at the Cape of Good Hope. Here it strikes the
Agulhas current at right angles, and hence possibly the deflection of a
part of that current.
But if there be a current constantly setting from the Cape of Good-Hope to
the south-east, how is it that the iceberg finds its way to the
neighborhood of that Cape, from the south polar regions? There is but one
way to account for it. There must be a counter undercurrent. These bergs,
setting deep in the water, are forced by this counter-current against the
surface current. This phenomenon has frequently been witnessed in the
Arctic seas. Captain Duncan, of the English whaler _Dundee_, in describing
one of his voyages to Davis' Strait, thus speaks of a similar drift of
icebergs:--"It was awful to behold the immense icebergs working their way
to the north-east from us, and not one drop of water to be seen; they were
working themselves right through the middle of the ice." Here was an
undercurrent of such force as to carry a mountain of ice, ripping and
crashing through a field of solid ice. Lieutenant De Haven, who made a
voyage in search of Sir John Franklin, describes a similar phenomenon as
follows:--"The iceberg, as before observed, came up very near to the
stern of our ship; the intermediate space, between the berg and the
vessel, was filled with heavy masses of ice, which, though they had been
previously broken by the immense weight of the berg, were again formed
into a compact body by its pressure. The berg was drifting at the rate of
about four knots, and by its force on the mass of ice, was pushing the
ship before it, as it appeared, to inevitable destruction." And again, on
the next day, he writes:--"The iceberg still in sight, but drifting away
fast to the north-east." Here was another undercurrent, driving a monster
iceberg through a field of broken ice at the rate of four knots per hour!
When we had travelled in the _Alabama_ some distance to the eastward, on
the 39th and 40th parallels, the current made another curve--this time to
the north-east. If the reader will again refer to a map, he will find that
the Agulhas current, as it came along through the Mozambique Channel and
by the Cape of Good Hope, was a south-westerly current. It being now a
north-easterly current, he observes that it is running back whence it
came, in an ellipse! We have seen, in a former part of this work, that the
Gulf Stream of the North Atlantic performs a circuit around the coasts of
the United States, Newfoundland, the British Islands, the coasts of Spain
and Portugal, the African coast, and so on, into the equatorial current,
and thence back again to the Gulf of Mexico. From my observation of
currents in various parts of the world, my impression is, that the circle
or ellipse is their normal law. There are, of course, offshoots from one
circle, or ellipse, to another, and thus a general intermingling of the
waters of the earth is going on--but the normal rule for the guidance of
the water, as of the wind, is the curve.
As we approached the 40th parallel of latitude, my attention was again
forcibly drawn to the phenomena of the winds. The "Brave West Winds"--as
the sailors call them--those remarkable polar trade-winds, now began to
prevail with wonderful regularity. On the 30th of September, we observed
in latitude 39 deg. 12', and longitude 31 deg. 59'. The following is the
entry on my journal for that day:--"Rough weather, with the wind fresh
from the N. N. W. with passing rain-squalls. Sea turbulent. Barometer
29.47; thermometer, air 55 deg., water 58; distance run in the last
twenty-four hours, 221 miles. Weather looking better at noon. The water
has resumed its usual deep-sea hue. [We had been running over an
extensive tract of soundings, the water being of that pea-green tint
indicating a depth of from sixty to seventy-five fathoms.] In high
southern latitudes, in the Indian Ocean, the storm-fiend seems to hold high
carnival all the year round. He is constantly racing round the globe, from
west to east, howling over the waste of waters in his mad career. Like
Sisyphus, his labors are never ended. He not only does not rest himself,
but he allows old Ocean none, constantly lashing him into rage. He scatters
the icebergs hither and thither to the great terror of the mariner, and
converts the moisture of the clouds into the blinding snow-flake or the
pelting hail. As we are driven, on dark nights, before these furious winds,
we have only to imitate the Cape Horn navigator--'tie all fast, and let her
rip,' iceberg or no iceberg. When a ship is running at a speed of twelve or
fourteen knots, in such thick weather that the look-out at the cat-head can
scarcely see his own nose, neither sharp eyes, nor water thermometers are
of much use."
These winds continued to blow from day to day, hurrying us forward with
great speed. There being a clear sweep of the sea for several thousand
miles, unobstructed by continent or island, the waves rose into long,
sweeping swells, much more huge and majestic than one meets with in any
other ocean. As our little craft, scudding before a gale, would be
overtaken by one of these monster billows, she would be caught up by its
crest, like a cock-boat, and darted half-way down the declivity that lay
before her, at a speed that would cause the sailor to hold his breath. Any
swerve to the right, or the left, that would cause the ship to "broach
to," or come broadside to the wind and sea, would have been fatal. These
"brave west winds," though thus fraught with danger, are a great boon to
commerce. The reader has seen how the currents in this part of the ocean
travel in an ellipse. We have here an ellipse of the winds. The _Alabama_
is hurrying to the Far East, before a continuous, or almost continuous
north-west gale. If she were a few hundred miles to the northward of her
present position, she might be hurrying, though not quite with equal
speed, before the south-east trades, to the Far West. We have thus two
parallel winds blowing all the year round in opposite directions, and only
a few hundred miles apart.
Storms are now admitted by all seamen to be gyratory, as we have seen.
When I was cruising in the Gulf Stream, I ventured to enlarge this theory,
as the reader may recollect, and suggested that rotation was the normal
condition of all extra-tropical winds on the ocean, where there was
nothing to obstruct them--of the moderate wind, as well as of the gale. I
had a striking confirmation of this theory in the "brave west winds."
These winds went regularly around the compass, in uniform periods; the
periods occupying about three days. We would take them at about N. N. W.,
and in the course of the "period" they would go entirely around the
compass, and come back to the same point; there being an interval of calm
of a few hours. The following diagram will illustrate this rotary motion.
Let Figure 1, on the opposite page, represent a circular wind--the wind
gyrating in the direction of the arrows, and the circle travelling at the
same time, along the dotted lines from west to east. If the northern
segment of this circular wind passes over the ship, the upper dotted line
from A to A2, will represent her position during its passage. At A,
where the ship first takes the wind, she will have it from about
north-west; and at A2, where she is about to lose it, she will have it
from about south-west. The ship is supposed to remain stationary, whilst
the circle is passing over her. Now, this is precisely the manner in which
we found all these winds to haul in the _Alabama_. We would have the wind
from the north-west to the south-west, hauling gradually from one point to
the other, and blowing freshly for the greater part of three days. It
would then become light, and, in the course of a few hours, go round to
the south, to the south-east, to the east, and then settle in the
north-west, as before.
[Illustration]
Figure 2 represents two of these circular winds--and the reader must
recollect that there is a constant series of them--one following the other
so closely as to overlap it. Now, if the reader will cast his eye upon the
letter C, near the upper dotted line, in the overlapped space, he will
observe why it is, that there is always a short interval of calm before
the north-west wind sets in, the second time. The wind within that space
is blowing, or rather should blow, according to the theory, two opposite
ways at once--from the N. N. W., and the S. S. E. The consequence is,
necessarily, a calm. It is thus seen that the theory, that these "brave
west winds" are a series of circular winds, harmonizes entirely with the
facts observed by us. The lower dotted line is merely intended to show in
what direction the wind would haul, if the southern segment, instead of
the northern, passed over the ship. In that case, the ship would take the
wind, from about N. N. E., as at B, and lose it at south-east, as at B2.
In the region of the "brave west winds," it would seem that the northern
segment always passes over that belt of the ocean. The received theory of
these south polar-winds, is not such as I have assumed. Former writers
have not supposed them to be circular winds at all. They suppose them to
pass over the south-east trade-winds, as an upper current, and when they
have reached the proper parallel, to descend, become surface-winds, and
blow home, as straight winds, to the pole. But I found a difficulty in
reconciling this theory with the periodical veering of the wind entirely
around the compass, as above described. If these were straight winds,
blowing contrary to the trades, why should they not blow steadily like the
trades? But if we drop the straight-wind theory, and take up the circular
hypothesis, all the phenomena observed by us will be in conformity with
the latter. The periodical hauling of the wind will be accounted for, and
if we suppose that the northern half of the circle invariably passes over
the ship, in the passage-parallels, we shall see how it is that the wind
is blowing nearly all the time from the westward. To account for the fact
that the northern half of the circle invariably passes over these
parallels, we have only to suppose the circle to be of sufficient diameter
to extend to, or near the pole.
[Illustration]
Here is the figure. It extends from the parallel of 40 deg., to the pole;
it is therefore fifty degrees, or three thousand miles, in diameter.
Half-way from its northern to its southern edge, would be the 65th
parallel. Along this parallel, represented by the dotted line, which
passes through the centre of the circle, the vortex, V, or calm spot, would
travel. There should be calms, therefore, about the 65th parallel. In the
southern half of the circle, or that portion of it between the vortex and
the pole, easterly winds should prevail. Navigators between the parallels
of 65 deg. and 75 deg., speak of calms as the normal meteorological
condition. All nature seems frozen to death, the winds included.
Unfortunately, we have no reliable data for the parallels beyond, and do
not know, therefore, whether easterly winds are the prevalent winds or not.
It is probable, as we approached the pole, that we should find another
calm. The winds, [see the arrows,] as they come hurrying along the circle,
from its northern segment, bring with them an impetus _toward_ the east,
derived from the diurnal motion of the earth, on its axis. As these winds
approach the pole, this velocity increases, in consequence of the
diminishing diameter of the parallels. To illustrate. If a particle of air
on the equator, having a velocity eastward of fifteen miles per minute--and
this is the rate of the revolution of the earth on its axis--should be
suddenly transported to a point, distant five miles from the pole, it
would have sufficient velocity to carry it entirely around the pole in one
minute. Here we have two forces acting in opposition to each other--the
impetus of the wind _toward_ the east, given to it by the diurnal motion of
the earth, and an impetus _from_ the east, given to it by whatever causes
are hurrying it around the circle. These two forces necessarily neutralize
each other, and a calm is the consequence. It is in this calm region near
the poles, that the winds probably ascend, to take their flight back to
the equator, in obedience to that beautiful arrangement for watering the
earth, which I described some pages back.
There remains but one other fact to be reconciled with our theory. It has
been seen that consecutive circles of wind passed over the _Alabama_, in
periods of three days each. Did this time correspond with the known rate
of travel of the circles? Almost precisely. Referring again to the last
diagram, it will be remembered that the _Alabama_ was near the northern
edge of the circle. Let A A represent her position at the beginning and
end of each wind. The chord of the segment, represented by the dotted
line, is about 1500 miles in length. The circles travel at the rate of
about 20 miles per hour. Multiply the number of hours--72--in three days,
by 20, and we shall have 1440 miles. It is not pretended, of course, that
these figures are strictly accurate, but they are sufficiently so to show,
at least, that there is no discordance between the fact and the theory.
Soon after leaving the Cape of Good Hope, the storm-birds began to gather
around us in considerable numbers--the Cape pigeon, the albatross, and
occasionally the tiny petrel, so abundant in the North Atlantic. These
birds seemed to be quite companionable, falling in company with the ship,
and travelling with her for miles at a time. On the occasion of one of the
short calms described, we caught an albatross, with hook and line, which
measured ten feet across the wings. The monster bird was very fat, and it
was quite a lift to get it inboard. Though very active on the wing, and
rising with great facility from the water, in which it sometimes alights,
it lay quite helpless when placed upon the deck. It did not seem to be
much alarmed at the strangeness of its position, but looked at us with the
quiet dignity and wisdom of an owl, as though it would interrogate us as
to what we were doing in its dominions. These birds live in the midst of
the great Indian Ocean, thousands of miles away from any land--only making
periodical visits to some of the desert islands; or, it may be, to the
Antarctic Continent, to incubate and rear their young.
I have described at some length the nature of the great circles of wind
which form the normal meteorological condition of the region of ocean
through which we were passing. This normal condition was sometimes
interfered with by the passage of cyclones of smaller diameter--a circle
within a circle; both circles, however, obeying the same laws. We took one
of these cyclones on the 5th of October. I do not design to repeat, here,
the description of a cyclone, and only refer to that which we now
encountered, for the purpose of showing that the _Alabama ran a race with
it, and was not very badly beaten_. This race is thus described in my
journal: "Morning dull, cloudy, and cool. The wind hauled, last night, to
north, and is blowing a fresh breeze at noon. Barometer, 30.14.
Thermometer, air 54 deg., water 60 deg. Current during the last
twenty-four hours, thirty miles east. The weather continued to thicken in
the afternoon, and the wind to increase, with a falling barometer,
indicating the approach of a gale. At nine P. M., the squalls becoming
heavy, we furled the top-gallant sails and foresail, close-reefed the
topsails, and took the bonnets off the trysails. Under this reduced sail
we continued to scud the ship all night--the barometer still falling,
the wind increasing, and a heavy sea getting up. We had entered the
north-eastern edge of a cyclone. The next morning the wind was still north
by west, having hauled only a single point in twelve hours; showing that
we had been running, neck and neck, with the gale.
If the reader will recollect that, in these circular gales, the change of
the wind is due to the passage of the circle over the ship, he will have
no difficulty in conceiving that, if the ship travels as fast as the
circle, and in the same direction, the wind will not change at all. Now,
as the wind had changed but a single point in twelve hours, it is evident
that the _Alabama_ had been travelling nearly as fast as the circular
gale. The race continued all the next day--the wind not varying half a
point, and the barometer settling by scarcely perceptible degrees. Toward
night, however, the barometer began to settle quite rapidly, and the wind
increased, and began to haul to the westward. The gale had acquired
accelerated speed, and was now evidently passing ahead of us quite
rapidly; for by half-past four A. M. the wind was at west, having hauled
nearly a quadrant in twelve hours. At this point we had the lowest
barometer, 29.65. The centre of the storm was then just abreast of us,
bearing about south, and distant perhaps a hundred miles. At five A. M.,
or in half an hour afterward, the wind shifted suddenly from W. to W. S.
W., showing that the vortex had passed us, and that the _Alabama_ was at
last beaten! The wind being still somewhat fresher than I desired, I hove
the ship to, on the port tack, to allow the gale to draw farther ahead of
me. After lying to three hours, the barometer continuing to rise, and the
wind to moderate, we filled away, and shaking out some of the reefs,
continued on our course.
On the 12th of October, we passed the remarkable islets of St. Peter and
St. Paul, a sort of half-way mile-posts between the Cape of Good Hope and
the Strait of Sunda. These islets are the tops of rocky mountains,
shooting up from great depths in the sea. They are in the midst of a
dreary waste of waters, having no other land within a thousand miles and
more, of them. They are composed of solid granite, without vegetation, and
inhabited only by the wild birds of the ocean. I cannot imagine a more
fitting station for a meteorologist. He would be in the midst of constant
tempests, and might study the laws of his science, without interruption
from neighboring isle or continent. There being an indifferent anchorage
under the lee of St. Paul, we scanned the island narrowly with our
glasses, as we passed, not knowing but we might find some adventurous
Yankee whaler, or seal-catcher, trying out blubber, or knocking a seal on
the head. These islands are frequently sighted by India-bound ships, and
it was my intention to cruise a few days in their vicinity, but the bad
weather hurried me on.
We took another gale, on the night after leaving them, and had some damage
done to our head-rail and one of our quarter-boats. The scene was a
sublime one to look upon. The seas--those long swells before
described--were literally running mountains high, the wind was howling
with more than usual fury, and a dense snow-storm was pelting us from the
blackest and most angry-looking of clouds. I was now in longitude 83 deg.
E., and bore away more to the northward. Although the thermometer had not
settled below 50 deg., we felt the cold quite piercingly--our clothing
being constantly saturated with moisture. On the 14th of October, we had
the first tolerably fine day we had experienced for the last two weeks, and
we availed ourselves of it, to uncover the hatches and ventilate the ship,
getting up from below, and airing the damp bedding and mildewed clothing.
The constant straining of the ship, in the numerous gales she had
encountered, had opened the seams in her bends, and all our state-rooms
were leaking more or less, keeping our beds and clothing damp. On the next
day, another gale overtook us, in which we lay to ten hours, to permit it,
as we had done the gale we ran the race with, to pass ahead of us.
And thus it was, that we ran down our easting, in the region of the "brave
west winds," with every variety of bad weather, of the description of
which, the reader must, by this time, be pretty well tired. On the 17th of
October, I was nearly _antipodal_ with my home in Alabama. By the way, has
the reader ever remarked that land is scarcely ever antipodal with land?
Let him take a globe, and he will be struck with the fact, that land and
water have been almost invariably arranged opposite to each other. May not
this arrangement have something to do with the currents, and the
water-carriers, the winds?
On the morning of the 21st of October, at about five o'clock, we crossed
the tropic of Capricorn, on the 100th meridian of east longitude. We still
held on to our west winds, though they had now become light. We took the
trade-wind from about S. S. E. almost immediately after crossing the
tropic. We thus had the good fortune, a second time, to cross the tropic
without finding a calm-belt; the two counter-winds blowing almost side by
side with each other. We had been twenty-four days and three quarters from
the Cape of Good Hope, and in that time had run, under sail
alone--occasionally lying to, in bad weather--4410 miles; the average run,
per day, being 178 miles. We had brought the easterly current with us,
too, all the way. It had set us twenty miles to the north-east, on the
day we reached the tropic. In all this lengthened run, we had sighted only
two or three sails. One of these was a steamer, which we overhauled, and
boarded, but which proved to be English. For nineteen days we did not see
a sail; and still we were on the great highway to India. There must have
been numerous travellers on this highway, before and behind us, but each
was bowling along at a rapid, and nearly equal pace, before the "brave
west winds," enveloped in his own circle, and shut out from the view of
his neighbor by the mantle of black rain-clouds in which he was wrapped.
Our mysterious friends, the Cape-pigeons, disappeared, as we approached
the tropics.
We now ran rapidly through the south-east trades, with fine weather, until
we reached the 12th parallel of south latitude, when we passed suddenly
into the monsoon region. The monsoons were undergoing a change. The east
monsoon was dying out, and the west monsoon was about to take its place.
The struggle between the outgoing, and the incoming wind would occupy
several weeks, and during all this time I might expect sudden shifts and
squalls of wind and rain, with densely overcast skies, and much thunder
and lightning. My intention was to make for the Strait of Sunda, that
well-known passage into, and out of the China seas, between the islands of
Java and Sumatra, cruise off it some days, and then run into the China
seas. On the evening of the 26th we spoke an English bark, just out of the
Strait, which informed us that the United States steamer _Wyoming_ was
cruising in the Strait, in company with a three-masted schooner, which she
had fitted up as a tender, and that she anchored nearly every evening
under the island of Krakatoa. Two days afterward, we boarded a Dutch ship,
from Batavia to Amsterdam, which informed us, that a boat from the
_Wyoming_ had boarded her, off the town of Anger in the Strait. There
seemed, therefore, to be little doubt, that if we attempted the Strait, we
should find an enemy barring our passage.
As we drew near the Strait, we began to fall in with ships in considerable
numbers. On the 31st of October, no less than six were cried from aloft,
at the same time, all standing to the south-west, showing that they were
just out of the famous passage. The wind being light and baffling, we got
up steam, and chased and boarded four of them--three English, and one
Dutch. By this time, the others were out of sight--reported, by those we
had overhauled, to be neutral--and the night was setting in dark and
rainy. The Dutch ship, like the last one we had boarded, was from Batavia,
and corroborated the report of the presence of the _Wyoming_ in these
waters. She had left her at Batavia, which is a short distance only from
the Strait of Sunda. The weather had now become exceedingly oppressive.
Notwithstanding the almost constant rains, the heat was intense. On the
morning of the 6th of November, we boarded an English ship, from Foo Chow
for London, which informed us, that an American ship, called the _Winged
Racer_, had come out of the Strait, in company with her. In the afternoon,
two ships having been cried from aloft, we got up steam, and chased,
hoping that one of them might prove to be the American ship reported. They
were both English; but whilst we were chasing these two English ships, a
third ship hove in sight, farther to windward, to which we gave chase in
turn.
This last ship was to be our first prize in East-Indian waters. A gun
brought the welcome stars and stripes to her peak, and upon being boarded,
she proved to be the bark _Amanda_, of Boston, from Manilla bound to
Queenstown for orders. The _Amanda_ was a fine, rakish-looking ship, and
had a cargo of hemp, and sugar. She was under charter-party to proceed
first to Queenstown, and thence to the United States, for a market, if it
should be deemed advisable. On the face of each of the three bills of
lading found among her papers, was the following certificate from the
British Consul at Manilla:--"I hereby certify that Messrs. Ker & Co., the
shippers of the merchandise specified in this bill of lading, are British
subjects established in Manilla, and that according to invoices produced,
the said merchandise is shipped by order, and for account of Messrs.
Holliday, Fox & Co., British subjects, of London, in Great Britain." As
nobody swore to anything, before the Consul, his certificate was valueless
to protect the property, and the ship and cargo were both condemned. The
night set in very dark and squally, whilst we were yet alongside of this
ship. We got on board from her some articles of provisions, and some sails
and cordage to replace the wear and tear of the late gales we had passed
through, and made a brilliant bonfire of her at about ten P. M. The
conflagration lighted up the sea for many miles around, and threw its grim
and ominous glare to the very mouth of the Strait.
The next day we ran in and anchored under Flat Point, on the north side of
the Strait, in seventeen fathoms water, about a mile from the coast of
Sumatra. My object was to procure some fruits and vegetables for my crew,
who had been now a long time on salt diet.