en in
their labour, through weariness and despondency, they now renewed their
efforts with such alacrity and spirit, that before eight o'clock in the
morning the leak was so far from having gained upon the pumps, that the
pumps had gained considerably upon the leak. Every body now talked of
getting the ship into some harbour, as a thing not to be doubted, and as
hands could be spared from the pumps, they were employed in getting up
the anchors: The stream anchor and best bower we had taken on board; but
it was found impossible to save the little bower, and therefore it was
cut away at a whole cable; we lost also the cable of the stream anchor
among the rocks; but in our situation these were trifles which scarcely
attracted our notice. Our next business was to get up the fore top-mast,
and fore-yard, and warp the ship to the south-east, and at eleven,
having now a breeze from the sea, we once more got under sail and stood
for the land.

It was however impossible long to continue the labour by which the pumps
had been made to gain upon the leak, and as the exact situation of it
could not be discovered, we had no hope of stopping it within. In this
situation, Mr Monkhouse, one of my midshipmen, came to me and proposed
an expedient that he had seen used on board a merchant ship, which
sprung a leak that admitted above four feet water an hour, and which by
this expedient was brought safely from Virginia to London; the master
having such confidence in it, that he took her out of harbour, knowing
her condition, and did not think it worth while to wait till the leak
could be otherwise stopped. To this man, therefore, the care of the
expedient, which is called fothering the ship, was immediately
committed, four or five of the people being appointed to assist him, and
he performed it in this manner: He took a lower studding sail, and
having mixed together a large quantity of oakum and wool, chopped pretty
small, he stitched it down in handfuls upon the sail, as lightly as
possible, and over this he spread the dung of our sheep and other filth;
but horse dung, if we had had it, would have been better. When the sail
was thus prepared, it was hauled under the ship's bottom by ropes, which
kept it extended, and when it came under the leak, the suction which
carried in the water, carried in with it the oakum and wool from the
surface of the sail, which in other parts the water was not sufficiently
agitated to wash off.[81] By the succ