The soft bread and fresh beef we had taken on board at Penzance were
soon consumed by the women and children, who speedily rallied from their
exhaustion.

The wind, however, fell very light, and there appeared to be a prospect
of our not being able to get in that night.

On inquiry, papa found that the master and first mate of the wrecked
ship had been tipsy for some days, and had quarrelled desperately with
each other, and the second mate, interfering, had been nearly killed.
They had got completely out of their course, and none of them knew where
they were. They had been bound for the Thames. The men said that when
they saw the Longships they fancied that it was the Eddystone, and that
when they struck they supposed that they were not far off Plymouth
Breakwater, though they were wondering why they did not see the light.

"It is one of the many sad examples we have had of the effects of
drinking," observed papa. "If I had to make a voyage, I should choose a
temperance vessel. Though a master may appear sober enough in port
under the eyes of his owners, unless he is a temperate man, one can
never tell what he may do at sea."

On further inquiries we found that nearly half the crew were as tipsy as
their officers, and that they, with the cabin passengers who had
remained aft, had been washed away. The people saved were steerage
passengers, with the exception of one little boy, whose parents and
friends had perished. However, the satisfaction of having been the
means of saving the lives of these poor people was to us very great. We
were of course greatly interested in the boy, Nat Harvey, who was about
six years old. Poor little fellow, he had been so frightened that he
was not fully aware of what had occurred, and did not appear fully to
realise his loss. He seemed to think that his papa and mamma, and his
Aunt Fanny and brother and sister, had gone off in a boat, and that he
should see them again before long. He kept continually asking why they
were not with us. When he heard that we were going to Saint Ives, he
said that he hoped we should find them there. One of the women, with a
kind heart, had taken him under her charge, and she sat on the cabin
floor holding him in her arms with his head resting on her lap, every
now and then speaking words of comfort, and endeavouring to get him to
go to sleep. Papa inquired from the passengers and crew if they knew
anything of his family, or where they were goin