During this time the ship was drawing nearer and nearer to the breakers, which called our attention {61} from the boat to look out for our own safety; but she was seen for some time struggling hard to follow the ship as we entered the breakers, the sight of which was appalling. On the ship making the first plunge, every countenance looked dismay; and the sun, at the time just sinking below the horizon, seemed to say, “Prepare for your last.” Mr. Mumford was now ordered to the masthead, to point out the channel. The water decreasing from 8 to 2½ fathoms, she struck tremendously on the second reef or shoal; and the surges breaking over her stern overwhelmed everything on deck. Every one who could, sprang aloft, and clung for life to the rigging. The waves at times broke ten feet high over her, and at other times she was in danger of foundering: she struck again and again, and, regardless of her helm, was tossed and whirled in every direction, and became completely unmanageable. Night now began to spread an impenetrable gloom over the turbulent deep. Dark, indeed, was that dreadful night. We had got about a mile into the breakers, and not far from the rocks at the foot of the cape, against which the foaming surges wreaked their fury unceasingly. Our anxiety was still further increased by the wind dying away, and the tide still ebbing. At this instant, some one called out, “We are all lost, the ship is among the rocks.” A desperate effort was then made to let go the anchors—two were thrown overboard; the sails kept flapping for some time: nor was the danger diminished by learning the fact {62} that the surf dragged ship, anchors, and all, along with it. But there is a limit to all things: hour after hour had passed, and terrific was the sight; yet our faithful bark still defied the elements, until the tide providentially beginning to flow—just at a time when it appeared as if no earthly power could save us from a watery grave—brought about our deliverance by carrying the ship along with it into Baker’s Bay, snug within the Cape, where we lay in safety. Here are two points for consideration; first, the time of sounding: and, secondly, the time chosen for entering the breakers. In respect to both, there was an unwarrantable precipitation—a manifest want of sound judgment. We made the land in the middle of a storm, the channel and coast both unknown to us, and without either pilot or guide: under such circumstances, it was evident to all that no boat could live on the water at the time, far less reach the shore; and our entering the breakers at so late an hour, the sun at the time not being fifty minutes above the horizon, the channel also being unexplored, was certainly a premature and forlorn undertaking: but there existed such disunion—such a spirit of contradiction on board—that the only wonder is how we ever got so far. But I must now inform the reader what became of the boat.