st of Chili. In a few days the
Blossom reached the Easter Island, of Cook. Her next visit was to
Pitcairn's Island, which the reviewer thinks "the most interesting point
in the whole voyage." We do not proceed in the outline, but "look in" at
"the Island." To this spot, as the public have for some years been
aware, the Mutineers of the Bounty carried that ship, after they had
deprived Capt. Bligh of his command, and turned him adrift in the middle
of the Pacific Ocean.[5]
[5] Who does not recollect the delightful narrative published
some years since by Mr. Mariner, in his account of the Tonga
Islands; the poem of "the Island," by Lord Byron; and countless
dramatic representations of this unhappy affair. We remember an
affecting version about seven years since at Sadler's Wells
Theatre: and only a few weeks since a few of its incidents were
embodied in a melo-dramatic piece called "Neuha's Cave, or the
South Sea Mutineers," at Covent Garden Theatre.
In the end, only one white man, old Adams, remained alive of the
mutineers who had landed. Of these, only one died a natural death;
another was killed by accident; six were murdered; and but one remained
to tell the tale.
After the greater number of the party had been murdered off, things went
on pretty smoothly, till one M'Coy, who had been employed in a
distillery in Scotland, tried an experiment with the tea-root, and
succeeded in producing a bottle of ardent spirits. This induced one
Quintal to 'alter his kettle into a still,' and the natural consequence
ensued. Like the philosopher who destroyed himself with his own
gunpowder, M'Coy, intoxicated to frenzy, threw himself from a cliff and
was killed; and Quintal having lost his wife by accident, demanded the
lady of one of his two remaining companions. This modest request being
refused, he attempted to murder his countrymen; but they, having
discovered his intention, agreed, that as Quintal was no longer a safe
member of their community, the sooner he was put out of the way the
better. Accordingly, they split his skull with an axe.
Adams and Young were now the sole survivors out of the fifteen males
that landed upon the island. Young did not live long.
Adams was thus left the only Englishman on Pitcairn's Island. Being
thoroughly tired of mutiny, bloodshed, and irreligion, and deeply
sensible of the extent of his own guilt, he resolutely set about the
only sound course of repentan
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