areys embarked, although
there yet remained upon the Medusa more than sixty persons. Then the
brave and generous M. Espiau, commander of the shallop, quitted the line
of boats, and returned to the frigate, with the intention of saving all
the wretches who had been abandoned. They all sprung into the shallop;
but as it was very much overloaded, seventeen unfortunates preferred
remaining on board, rather than expose themselves as well as their
companions to certain death. But, alas! the greater part afterwards fell
victims to their fears or their devotion. Fifty-two days after they were
abandoned, no more than three of them were alive, and these looked more
like skeletons than men. They told that their miserable companions had
gone afloat upon planks and hen-coops, after having waited in vain
forty-two days for the succour which had been promised them, and that
all had perished.[4]

[Footnote 4: Two, out of the three wretches who were saved from
the wrecks of the Medusa, died a few days after their arrival at
the colony; and the third, who pretended to know a great many
particulars relative to the desertion of the frigate, was
assassinated in his bed at Senegal, when he was just upon the eve
of setting off for France. The authorities could not discover the
murderer, who had taken good care to flee from his victim after
having killed him.]

The shallop, carrying with difficulty all those she had saved from the
Medusa, slowly rejoined the line of boats which towed the raft. M.
Espiau earnestly besought the officers of the other boats to take some
of them along with them; but they refused, alleging to the generous
officer that he ought to keep them in his own boat, as he had gone for
them himself. M. Espiau, finding it impossible to keep them all without
exposing them to the utmost peril, steered right for a boat which I will
not name. Immediately a sailor sprung from the shallop into the sea, and
endeavoured to reach it by swimming; and when he was about to enter it,
an officer who possessed great influence, pushed him back, and, drawing
his sabre, threatened to cut off his hands, if he again made the
attempt. The poor wretch regained the shallop, which was very near the
pinnace, where we were. Various friends of my father supplicated M.
Laperere, the officer of our boat, to receive him on board. My father
had his arms already out to catch him, when M. Laperere instantly let go
the rope whi