dark, we struck upon the island. Nothing could equal
the distraction, the shrieks, and despair of the whole crew, until I,
knowing there was not a moment to be lost, cheered up their spirits, and
bade them not despond, but do as I should request them. In a few minutes
the vessel was half full of water, and the enormous castle of ice that
seemed to hem us in on every side, in some places falling in hideous
fragments upon the deck, killed one half of the crew; upon which,
getting upon the summit of the mast, I contrived to make it fast to a
great promontory of the ice, and calling to the remainder of the crew to
follow me, we all escaped from the wreck, and got upon the summit of the
island.

The rising sun soon gave us a dreadful prospect of our situation, and
the loss, or rather iceification, of the vessel; for being closed in
on every side with castles of ice during the night, she was absolutely
frozen over and buried in such a manner that we could behold her under
our feet, even in the central solidity of the island. Having debated
what was best to be done, we immediately cut down through the ice, and
got up some of the cables of the vessel, and the boats, which, making
fast to the island, we towed it with all our might, determined to bring
home island and all, or perish in the attempt. On the summit of the
island we placed what oakum and dregs of every kind of matter we could
get from the vessel, which, in the space of a very few hours, on
account of the liquefying of the ice, and the warmth of the sun, were
transformed into a very fine manure; and as I had some seeds of exotic
vegetables in my pocket, we shortly had a sufficiency of fruits and
roots growing upon the island to supply the whole crew, especially the
bread-fruit tree, a few plants of which had been in the vessel; and
another tree, which bore plum-puddings so very hot, and with such
exquisite proportion of sugar, fruit, &c., that we all acknowledged
it was not possible to taste anything of the kind more delicious in
England: in short, though the scurvy had made such dreadful progress
among the crew before our striking upon the ice, the supply of
vegetables, and especially the bread-fruit and pudding-fruit, put an
almost immediate stop to the distemper.

We had not proceeded thus many weeks, advancing with incredible fatigue
by continual towing, when we fell in with a fleet of Negro-men, as they
call them. These wretches, I must inform you, my dear frie