arch out from that elevation the deepest
water and to con the ship accordingly.

On entering the channel it was discovered to be very narrow, so much so
indeed that at one point there was not width enough to work the ship,
and it was only by means of a very smartly executed half-board, under
Courtenay's directions from aloft, that we avoided plumping the schooner
ashore on the projecting spit. The water, too, was so shallow that, on
looking over the taffrail, it was seen to be quite thick and clouded
with the sand stirred up by the vessel's keel; whilst so close aboard of
us was the land on either hand that a couple of batteries, of, say, four
twenty-four pounders each, one on either side of the channel, would have
inevitably blown us out of the water. Most fortunately for us, it had
not occurred to the frequenters of the place to plant batteries at this
spot; so we passed in unmolested. The channel was about a mile in
length, on emerging from which we found ourselves in a landlocked lagoon
about four and a half miles wide at its broadest part, and so long that
neither extremity could be accurately defined even from the elevated
perch occupied by Courtenay. No sign whatever of anything like a
settlement could be anywhere seen from the deck; but Courtenay hailed us
to the effect that he could see something like a vessel's mast-head over
the middle island of a group of three on our starboard beam. He further
reported, on the question being put to him, that the water was very
shoal all round the ship, but that there were indications of something
like a channel to the southward and eastward; upon which sail was
shortened to lessen the schooner's speed through the water, and her head
was put in the direction indicated. This course was held for about two
miles, when, by Courtenay's direction, it was changed to south-south-
west. Another run of two miles enabled us to open the southern sides of
the three islands before referred to; and there, sure enough, in a snug
bight between the two most distant islands, and completely concealed
from to seaward by the lofty trees with which the ground was densely
overgrown, we discovered three feluccas at anchor, two of them being
small, one-masted craft, of about the same tonnage as the _Pinta_,
whilst the third carried three masts, and looked very much like the
identical craft we had seen when last we passed up the coast. They were
about four miles distant from us; and for the fir