, and a sermon read on board both ships; the prayer
appointed to be daily used at sea being altered, so as to adapt it
to the service in which we were engaged, the success which had
hitherto attended our efforts, and the peculiar circumstances
under which we were at present placed. The attention paid by the
men to the observance of their religious duties was such as to
reflect upon them the highest credit, and tended in no small
degree to the preservation of that regularity and good conduct for
which, with very few exceptions, they were invariably distinguished.

Our theatrical entertainments took place regularly once a
fortnight, and continued to prove a source of infinite amusement
to the men. Our stock of plays was so scanty, consisting of one or
two odd volumes, which happened accidentally to be on board, that
it was with difficulty we could find the means of varying the
performances sufficiently; our authors, therefore, set to work,
and produced, as a Christmas piece, a musical entertainment,
expressly adapted to our audience, and having such a reference to
the service on which we were engaged, and the success we had so
far experienced, as at once to afford a high degree of present
recreation, and to stimulate, if possible, the sanguine hopes
which were entertained by all on board, of the complete
accomplishment of our enterprise. We were at one time apprehensive
that the severity of the weather would prevent the continuance of
this amusement, but the perseverance of the officers overcame
every difficulty; and, perhaps for the first time since theatrical
entertainments were invented, more than one or two plays were
performed on board the Hecla with the thermometer below zero on
the stage.

The _North Georgia Gazette_, which I have already mentioned, was a
source of great amusement, not only to the contributors, but to
those who, from diffidence of their own talents or other reasons,
could not be prevailed on to add their mite to the little stock of
literary composition which was weekly demanded; for those who
declined to write were not unwilling to read, and more ready to
criticise than those who wielded the pen; but it was that
good-humoured sort of criticism that could not give offence. The
subjects handled in this paper were of course various, but
generally applicable to our own situation.

The return of each successive day had been always very decidedly
marked by a considerable twilight for some time about