The loss of the 'Ontario' gave rise to the longest passage ever made between Whampoa and New York. Captain Depeyster left Dilly, with the treasure saved from the wreck of his ship, for Batavia, and there chartered the American brig 'Pocahontas,' to carry it to Canton. Mr. Smith's agent there rechartered her to take as much of the proceeds of the treasure as she could carry in teas and silks to New York, where she safely arrived in charge of the first officer, Mr. Teel (Captain Snow having died on the passage), close upon ten months from Whampoa. 'A good full,' cries out the second mate to the man at the wheel as a breeze springs up. A first-rate 'old salt,' and as odd a fish, our second mate, as need be. I have been time and again amused with the yarns he has spun during his first watches. Of the war of 1812 he is full of anecdotes. He is always on the dolphin-striker when porpoises are around us, and usually strikes successfully. Anything not done in a sailor-like fashion excites him, and we hear him cry out, 'You'll never be a sailor. You were not shaped for a sailor. You were cut out to handle a musket, not a marlin-spike.' 'Sailors,' said he to me one evening, 'have their prejudices like others; they have always a run upon soldiers, more perhaps in joke than in earnest. A sailor will say, "Give me a messmate before a watchmate, a watchmate before a shipmate, a shipmate before a dog, a dog before a marine, a marine before a soldier, a soldier before--the devil." If you ask why a _marine_ in preference to a soldier, the answer is, because he knows the difference between the best bower anchor and--a "chaw of baccy!"' We now steered for Dampier Straits. Having left Booro astern, we were struck with a sudden and violent squall, resembling more a tornado. The rain poured down like a deluge, the rattling of the thunder and the vividness of the lightning were frightful. Our maintopsail-yard was snapped asunder in the slings, the fore and mizen topsails flew into ribbons; the jib disappeared from the bolt ropes. Each flash of lightning was succeeded by the darkness of Erebus, while in the midst of all, the loud voices of the officers and the replies of the men created a turmoil such as I had never witnessed. The squall was luckily of short duration; it came upon us during the dog watch, but so intelligently did all hands do their duty, that by midnight another maintopsail-yard was crossed, the sail bent, the other topsails and the jib replaced, and we were making good way with all sail set, 'low and aloft,' including royals and flying jib. The stars shone out with increased brilliancy, all things had returned to a condition of perfect quiet, so had one watch to their hammocks, and no sound fell upon the ear save the ripple of the water under the bows. We had noticed before, and this night particularly after the squall, a strong spicy odour, the air seemed 'breathing an aromatic redolence.'