Blackwood's Edinburgh magazine, Vol. 93, No. 571, May, 1863Various
History
Blackwood's Edinburgh magazine, Vol. 93, No. 571, May, 1863
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
The sufferings of these poor people on the barren cliff to which they
escaped were dreadful. Happily the waves brought ashore some pieces of
cloth as well as a cask of wine and a quantity of smoked pork. But the
sailors seized the wine and drank it; and the first night was spent in
cold and misery, for the snow lay deep on the ground, and there was no
fuel with which to make a fire. All lay down and slept—a sleep from
which they would probably never have wakened had not Douglas been roused
by a fearful scream, to which the wife of his servant gave utterance.
She had gone mad from privations and excitement, and died shrieking to
the last, so that her voice was heard over the wind and rain. She had
outlived all the women who went on board at Gravesend, and not a child
survived.
Mr Douglas was at this time barely nineteen years of age, yet such was
the force of his character that all about him, seamen as well as
soldiers, looked to him for instructions. He rescued a second cask of
wine from being broached this time by soldiers, though not without a
struggle. “We are all equals now,” said the leader of the mutineers;
“we’ll take no orders from you or anybody else.” “Won’t you!” cried
Douglas, springing at his throat with a knife; “you are under my
command; and if you don’t obey, by heavens, I’ll kill you!” The man
yielded; the small stock of provisions and wine was secured, and after a
vain attempt to penetrate through the forest, the whole party returned
again to the cliff—there to wait till either help should come from the
sea, or famine do its work and destroy them.
A feeling of despair was beginning to gain the mastery, when one day the
cry was heard, “A sail! a sail!” They had already set up a spar, and
hoisted a piece of cloth upon it; but the object was small, and might
not be discerned from a distance, and then what a fate awaited them! It
was not, however, so ordered. The sail approached; she was a small
schooner trading between St John and Great Jarvis; and the crew gave
back the cheer which the poor castaways raised in their agony, crowding
at the same time to the beach. They were all taken off and carried to
the place whither the schooner was bound, and spent the winter, roughly
but not unhappily, among the honest fishermen who had there established
themselves.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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