ship; so, before night
set in, we lashed it up in a piece of canvas, and with a shot at the
feet, committed it to the sea. Strange as it may appear, when the mate
found that we had taken the canvas for this purpose, he made it an
excuse for further abuse and ill-treatment. Not a day passed but one or
other of us got a kick or a blow from him or the captain. They made one
young lad very nearly leap overboard, where he would have been drowned.
I hauled him back, and calming him down, showed him the enormity of the
sin he was going to commit, and urged him to bear his trials, as they
must shortly be over.

At last we reached Carlisle Bay, where we brought up off Bridge Town,
the capital of the fertile island Barbadoes. The town lies round the
bay, and contains some handsome houses and broad streets. This island
is more level than most of the West India isles, with the exception of
the north-eastern quarter, called Scotland, when there is an elevation
of a thousand feet above the sea. It is rather less in size than the
Isle of Wight. What a wretched voyage had we had! How miserable and
crushed in spirit did I feel! The scene struck me, therefore, as
peculiarly beautiful, as, gliding up the bay, we saw spread out before
us the blue waters, fringed by the tall, graceful palms; the shining
white houses, circling round the shore; the trim, gallant men-of-war;
the merchantmen with their many-coloured flags; the numerous boats
pulling here and there, manned by shouting, grinning, laughing
negroes;--and then the planters' houses, and woods, and fields of
sugar-cane, and farms in the distance, made me feel that such scenes as
we had gone through could no longer be enacted with impunity.

The moment we dropped our anchor, the captain went on shore; and I found
that, to be beforehand with any of us who might inform against him, he
had given his own version of Taylor's death; which, of course, his mate
was ready to corroborate. When he returned on board, he gave a
triumphant glance forward, as much as to say, I have you still in my
power. So he had, as we found when once more we were at sea. I was
glad that the young lad Thompson, whom he had so ill-treated, deserted
the day before we sailed, and, I believe, entered aboard a man-of-war,
where he was safe.

While in harbour we had been quiet enough, but we had not been two days
at sea before the captain and mate commenced their old system of
tyranny. Everybody was ill-