tions for deliverance or
support in this distress. Having finished, I found myself in a more
composed frame; so having eaten a biscuit and drank a can of water, and
not seeing anything to be done whereby I could better my condition, I
sat me down upon the deck, and fell into the following soliloquy--

Peter, says I, what have you to do here?--Alas! replied I to myself, I
am fixed against my will in this dismal mansion, destined, as rats might
be, to devour the provisions only, and having eaten all up, to perish
with hunger for want of a supply.--Then, says I, of what use are you in
the world, Peter?--Truly, answered I, of no other use that I can see but
to be an object of misery for Divine vengeance to work upon, and to show
what a deplorable state human nature can be reduced to; for I cannot
think any one else can be so wretched.--And again, Peter, says I, what
have you been doing ever since you came into the world?--I am afraid,
says I, I can answer no better to this question than to either of the
former; for if only reasonable actions are to be reckoned among my
doings, I am sure I have done little worth recording; for let me see
what it all amounts to. I spent my first sixteen years in making a fool
of my mother; my three next in letting her make a fool of me, and in
being fool enough myself to get me a wife and two children before I was
twenty. The next year was spent in finding out the misery of slavery
from experience. Two years more I repined at the happiness of my
benefactor, and at finding it was not my lot to enjoy the same. This
year is not yet spent, and how many more are to come, and where they may
be passed, and what they may produce, requires a better head than mine
even to guess at; but certainly my present situation seems to promise
nothing beside woe and misery.--But hold a little, says I, and let me
clearly state my own wretchedness. I am here, it is true; but for any
good I have ever done or any advantage I have reaped in other places, I
am as well here as anywhere. I have no present want of food or unjust
or cruel enemy to annoy me; so as long as the ship continues entire
and provisions last, I shall do tolerably. Then why should I grieve
or terrify myself about what may come? What my frighted imagination
suggests may perhaps never happen. Deliverance, though not to be looked
for, is yet possible; and my future fate may be as different from
my present condition as this is from the hopes with which I