Reprinted Pieces

ve read in books of voyage and travel. Such books have had a strong fascination for my mind from my earliest childhood; and I wonder

in the bark of some fisherman,’ which is the shining star of a new world. Bruce is caged in Abyssinia, surrounded by the gory horrors which shall often startle him out of his sleep at home when years have passed away. Franklin, come to the end of his unhappy overland journey — would that it had been his last! — lies perishing of hunger with his brave companions: each emaciated figure stretched upon its miserable bed without the power to rise: all, dividing the weary days between their pray

y survive the horrors of the way. Famine, as they all must have foreseen, besets them early in their course. Some of the party die and are eaten; some are murdered by the rest and eaten. This one awful creature eats his fill, and sustains his strength, and lives on to be recaptured and taken back. The unrelateable experiences through which he has passed have been so tremendous, that he is not hanged as he might be, but goes back to his old chained-gang work. A little time, and he tempts one other prisoner away, seizes another boat, and flies once more — necessarily in the old hopeless direction, for he can take no other. He is soon cut off, and m

flash of my fire, and ‘Thursday October Christian,’ five-and-twenty years of age, son of the dead and gone Fletcher by a savage mother, leaps aboard His Majesty’s ship Briton, hove-to off Pitcairn’s Island; says his simple grace before eating, in good English;

aptain’s two dear daughters are aboard, and five other ladies. The ship has been driving many hours, has seven feet water in her hold, and her ma

en was. Another conversation taking place, Captain Pierce expressed extreme anxiety for the preservation of his beloved daughters, and earnestly asked the officer if he could devise any method of saving th

f those standing in the cuddy against the deck above them, and the shock was accompa

ght have been useful. They had actually skulked in their hammocks, leaving the working of the pumps and other necessary labours to the officers of the ship, and the soldiers, who had made uncommon exertions. Rouse

roadside towards the shore. When she struck, a number of the men climbed up

e given; he recommended that all should come to the side of the ship lying lowest on the ro

he passengers and most of the officers had assembled. The latter were employed in offering consolation to the unfortunate ladies; and, with unparall

g, when all would be safe. Captain Pierce, observing one of the young gentlemen loud in his exclamations of terror, and frequently cry that t

height, and rises almost perpendicular from its base. But at this particular spot, the foot of the cliff is excavated into a cavern of ten or twelve yards in depth, and of breadth equal to the length of a large ship. Th

hed almost from side to side of it. But when she struck, it was too dark for the unfortunate person

ance to get the lights, had been opposed and kept out by Mr. Rogers and Mr. Brimer, the third and fifth mates. The numbers there were, therefore, now increased to near fifty. Captain Pierce sat on a chair, a cot, or some other moveable,

g to wait the approach of dawn; and then assist the partners of his dangers to escape. But, observing that the poor ladies appeared parched and exhausted, he brought a basket of oranges and prevailed on s

gether. On this account, he attempted to go forward to look out, but immediately saw that the ship had separated in the middle, and that the forepart having changed its position, lay rather further out towards the sea. In such an emergency, when the next moment

s, for it snapped asunder before it reached them. However, by the light of a lanthorn, which a seaman handed through the skylight of the round-house to

er his legs, he was washed off by the surge. He now supported himself by swimming, until a returning wave dashed him against the back part of the cavern. Here he laid hold of a small projection in the rock, but was so much benumbed that he was on

round-house, the captain asked what was become of him, to which Mr. Rogers replied, that he was gone on deck to see what could be done. After this, a heavy sea breaking over the ship, the ladies

g the rocks for some time, Captain Pierce asked Mr. Rogers if he thought there was any possibility of saving the girls; to which he replied, he feared there was none; for they could only discover the black face of t

e replied, and they all went into the stern-gallery, and from thence to the upper-quarter-gallery on the poop. While there, a very heavy sea fell on board, and t

king of this heavy sea, they jointly seized a hen-coop. The same wave which proved fatal to some of those b

flowing of the tide all must be washed off, many attempted to get to the back or the sides of the cavern,

only a few minutes longer, he must have sunk under them. He was now prevented from joining Mr. Meriton

perished in attempting to ascend. They could yet discern some part of the ship, and in their dreary station solaced themselves with the hopes of its remaining entire until day-break; for,

long vibrated in their ears, in which the voice of female distress was lamentably distinguished, announced the dreadful catastrophe. In a few moments all

oast of Caffraria. It is resolved that the officers, passengers, and crew, in number one hundred and thirty-five souls, shall endeavour to penetrate on foot, across trackless deserts, infested

rst party is moving away he cries after some member of it who has been kind to him. The crying of a child might be supposed

m when the rough carpenter, who becomes his especial friend, lags behind. Beset by lions and tigers, by savages, by thirst, by hunger, by death in a crowd of ghastly shapes, they never — O Father of all mankind, thy name be blessed for it! — forget this child. The captain stops exhausted, and his faithful coxswain goes back and is seen

indful of his own parched and bleeding feet. Divided for a few days from the rest, they dig a grave in the sand and bury their good friend the cooper — these two companions alone in the wilderness — and then the time comes when they both are ill, and beg their wretched partners in despair, reduced and few in number now, to wait by them one day. They wait

own in the desert, and dies. But he shall be re-united in his immortal spirit — who can doubt it! — with the child, when he and th

ds revived from time to time among the English officers at the Cape, of a white woman with an infant, said to have been seen weeping outside a savage hut far in the interior, who was whis

ts of this unhappy wayfarer in the depths of his sorrow, in the bitterness of his anguish, in the helplessness of hi

were many trivial injuries that he had not forgiven, there was love that he had but poorly returned, there was friendship that he had too lightly prized: there were a million kind words that he might have spoken, a million kind looks that he might h

urney? Even so. Who shall say, that I may not then be tortured by such late regrets: that I may not then look from my exile on my empty place and undone work? I stand upon a sea-shore, where t