September 7th. We may now be said to have entered upon the saddest and most unpleasant part of the voyage, that of the Red Sea passage. The day after sailing, the look-out from the mast head reported a vessel aground off the starboard bow, with a second vessel close by, and, seemingly, in a similar predicament. Our thoughts at once adverted to the two troopships which left last night, so we hurried on, and, arriving at the spot, found we had surmised correctly. One only, the steamer, was aground; her consort, the sailing ship, being at anchor a safe distance off. We lost no time in sending hawsers on board, but it was not until the third day that we were successful in our efforts to haul her off. Our voyage resumed, we had scarcely got out of sight of the two ships, when the sudden cry of "man overboard!" was heard above the din of flapping canvas and creaking blocks. To stop the engines, gather in the upper sails, let fly sheets, and back the main yard, was the work of seconds; and before the ship was well around--smart as she was on her heel, too--the life-boat was half-way on her errand of mercy. Young Moxey was soon amongst us again, none the worse for his involuntary immersion, although his bath was more than an ordinary risky one, owing to the proximity of sharks. From that exalted observatory, the mast head, we noticed the red colour from which the sea derives its name. The surface has not a general ruddy tinge, as we most of us thought it had,--only here and there blood-red patches appear, mottling the vivid blue surface. September 11th.--My "journal" is a blank for three whole days, owing to the intense heat, which is simply unbearable. I can only give our friends a faint idea of what it was like, by asking them to imagine themselves strapped down over a heated oven whilst somebody has built a fire on top of them, to ensure a judicious "browning" on both sides alike. Sleep is out of the question, "prickly heat" is careful of that. As may be supposed, the sufferings of the deck hands--bad enough as in all conscience it was--were not to be compared with the tortures endured by the poor fellows in the stoke-hole, who had to be hoisted up in buckets that they might gasp in the scarcely less hot air on deck. From bad, this state of things came to worse--men succumbed to its influence, the sick list swelled, and, finally, death stalked insidiously in our midst. September 13th.--The first victim was John Bayley, a marine, who died to-day after an illness of only a few short hours. One curious thing about this sickness is that those attacked by it exhibit, more or less, symptoms of madness. One of my own messmates, for instance, whose life was preserved by a miracle, almost went entirely out of his mind. I will not dwell too long upon these sufferings, nor rekindle the harrowing scenes in your minds.