The evening was splendid. A clear sky studded with myriads of stars overhead, and below a calm unruffled sea, reflecting on its glassy surface the lights of the distant town, the low murmuring sounds from which, and the rippling of the water under the ships’ bows, were the only interruptions to the solemn stillness that prevailed after the people had retired to their berths. In our more immediate neighbourhood stretched out the long, low, sandy tract, on the seaward extremity of which the dark masses of Landguard fort could just be distinguished. With daybreak on the morning of the 12th came a favourable wind, though light, and again we took up our anchors and proceeded to sea. For some distance, after clearing the harbour, our course lay along the Suffolk coast, and so near in that objects on shore were plainly discernible. To us, who had long been stationed at Woodbridge, only a few miles inland, this was highly interesting. We knew every village, every copse, every knoll--nay, almost every tree. There were the houses in which we had so oft been hospitably entertained; there were the sheep-walks on which we had so often manœuvred; and there in the distance, as we passed the mouth of the Deben, our glasses showed us the very barrack on the hill, with its tiled roofs illumined by the noontide sun. About Bawdsey we left the coast, and steered straight over, with a light but favourable wind: the low sandy shores of Suffolk soon sank beneath the horizon. At noon fell in with a fleet of colliers bound for the river, and soon after saw the Sunk-Sand Light; when, as the wind had died away and the tide was setting us towards the bank, we anchored until the flood-tide. During the night a light breeze right aft, and smooth water, enabled us to make good progress; but towards morning (13th) the wind had very considerably increased, and although the coast was not in sight, we were sensible of its neighbourhood from the number of curious heavy-looking boats plying round us in all directions, having the foremast, with its huge lug-sail, stuck right up in the bow, or rather inclining over it. From one of these boats we soon procured a pilot--a little sturdy fellow, with a full, good-humoured countenance, and his breast decorated with a silver medal bearing the impress of an anchor, like our porters’ tickets, the badge of his calling.