"From Bombay to the Cape of Good Hope we had a quick and pleasant run. We stopped at the Cape for three weeks, and took in refreshments and some passengers, amongst whom was an old, rich planter, on his return to Holland, taking with him a black boy, his slave, one of the merriest and most obliging creatures I ever saw. The little fellow soon became the favourite of every one on board. Pontoben was the joy of every one except his master, who was ever correcting or finding fault with him. In one of my sallies, I called the old planter Satan. He was worthy of the title, and it adhered to him like a burdockhead. A more forbidding figure I have never seen. Tall and bony, he had the appearance of a gigantic skeleton covered with shrivelled brown leather; his forehead, large and deeply-furrowed, rose over two shaggy eyebrows, that overshadowed eyes of light blue, keen and restless. There was a peculiar expression in his whole face that made even the most daring feel uneasy on beholding him; and, unless they were excited at the time by hatred towards him, few ever dared his eye. I myself felt that no inducement could ever make me look upon him as a kindred being; and, indeed, he rarely spoke to any of his countrymen. His harsh, sepulchral tones were seldom heard but in execrations of poor Pontoben, who would leave his master with the big drops of anguish, from punishment, rolling down his ebony face; and, in a few minutes after, be seen laughing and sporting with the seamen. "On the evening of the seventh day after we had left Table Bay, the sun set like an immense globe of deep red fire, and the sky began to be overcast. The vessel was made all tight for the expected storm; and come, it did, soon after dark, with fearful force. All I had ever encountered could not be compared to its violence. The vessel pitched, groaned, and quivered, during the whole night, as if she would have gone to pieces; and, when day at length came, with no abatement of the storm, it only served to show us the extent of our danger. The sky was dark and lowering; heavy masses of clouds obscured the sun, and poured forth deluges of rain; the vessel laboured so much, and the wind was so strong, that no man on board could keep his feet, and the crew were lashed to different parts of the vessel, to prevent their being washed from the decks by the waves, which were every now and then making a complete breach over us. The captain and I shared the fatigues of the crew as we shared their danger. Another night of darkness and tempest, if possible more severe than the first, passed over our heads; still the vessel held good, and we hoped to weather the gale; when, just about an hour after daybreak, the wind chopped about nearly two points off the compass; the man at the helm, either through fatigue or mismanagement, allowed a tremendous sea to strike her too much forward, when she heeled so far over that a second wave laid her upon her beam ends. A cry of