country; but above all, their being looked up to as the organ and representatives of government in this remote region, have invested them with a moral influence among all classes which can scarcely be calculated.” In April eight rank and file from Chatham were employed under the direction of Lieutenant Stotherd, R.E., in completing the survey and contouring of Dover. A detachment of one sergeant, one corporal, and twenty-six privates, with four women and nine children, embarked at Woolwich on the 3rd April, 1849, on board the brig ‘Richard Dart,’ for New Zealand, under the command of Lieutenant Liddell, R.E. The ship sailed from Gravesend on the 5th April, and made a pleasant voyage until the 15th June, when, to the southward of the Cape of Good Hope, foggy and rainy weather set in, which continuing till the 19th, the ship was carried to the north side of Prince Edward’s Island and struck on the rocks. The waves at the time ran high, and within a few short minutes, the stern cabin-windows were stove in, the boats were filled and torn from the quarter, and while the vessel, beaten by a raging sea fell to pieces, wave after wave swept the decks and rigging and carried forty-seven of the crew and passengers into the deep. Of this number twenty-four men belonged to the detachment of sappers, who, with all their wives and children, and Lieutenant Liddell, perished. Eleven souls only out of sixty-three were saved. Among those who escaped were the captain of the ship—Samuel Potter—and four sappers, named Thomas Inglis, Owen Devany, James Reid and William Goldsmith. They took refuge in the mainmast rigging; and the wreck, having been driven broadside to the shore, the mainmast went by the board, falling fortunately upon the rock, and the survivors crawled along the shaking spar to the shore. The rocks being exceedingly steep and difficult of access, the men had to undergo much labour and fatigue in reaching the summit of the cliff, occasionally hanging on by fragile sea-weeds and every now and then throwing themselves into crevices to prevent the receding surge drawing them into the sea. Most of the party were barefoot and thinly clad. The night was cold; the snow fell fast and thick, and beating upon their drenched and shivering frames, their sufferings may possibly be imagined but never adequately described.