ealizes danger of trip, but is brave and
confident; gave him my revolver.

_Wednesday, 16th._ Cup of tea, 7 A.M. and breakfast as usual at 10;
turtle and gooney; Heavy sea on reef, and ship fast disappearing,
boats out picking up driftwood. Had to take the condenser and all wood
high up on the beach. Wind shifted suddenly from north to southeast.
Gave Talbot two hundred dollars in gold coin for possible expenses.

_Thursday, November 17._ Blowing hard from north. Tea at 7 A.M. The
gig anchored off shore. Mr. Bailey and I fixed up the well where
fresh water was found when mast fell; good-by to the old condenser.
"The little cherub that sits up aloft" doing good work for us all.

IV

THE SAILING OF THE GIG

_Friday, November 18._ The weather has been fine since the breaking up
of the storm of the second.

As to work, every one has had his duties portioned out to him, and
there is no doubt of the captain's wisdom in providing thus an
antidote to homesickness or brooding. Faces are--some of them--getting
"peaked," and quite a number of the party have been ill from lack of
power to digest the seal meat; but there are no complaints, we all
fare alike. Medicines are not to hand, but a day or two of abstinence
and quiet generally brings one around again. In the evenings, when we
gather around the smoking lamp after supper, there are frequent
discussions over our situation and prospects. They are, however,
mostly sanguine in tone, and it is not uncommon to hear the expression
"when we get home." No one _seems_ to have given up his hope of
eventual relief. It has been very noticeable, too, at such times that
no matter where the conversation begins it invariably swings around,
before the word is passed to "douse the glim," to those things of
which we are so completely deprived--to narratives of pleasant
gatherings--stories of banquets and festival occasions where toothsome
delicacies were provided. It would seem as though these reminiscences
were given us as a foil to melancholy, and they travel along with us
into our dreams.

Upon one point we are all agreed, that we are very fortunate in being
wrecked in so agreeable a climate, where heavy clothing is
unnecessary. The temperature has been, aside from the storm we had
soon after the landing, between seventy and seventy-five degrees
during the day and around fifty degrees at night. We are very sensible
of the discomforts that would be ours if tumbled upon some of