whom the captain of the _Ariadne_ kindly spared to us with a
first-rate recommendation; and in addition we had Warren, the gunner's
mate of the _Barracouta_, as gunner; Coombs, the carpenter's mate, as
carpenter; and Bartlett, the boatswain's mate, as boatswain. And by way
of a crew, the captain gave us forty of his best men, as he very well
could without weakening his own ship's company, a ship with
supernumeraries having most opportunely arrived from home only a few
days previously. It will thus be seen that, so far as strength was
concerned, we were fairly well able to take care of ourselves. We were
expected to do far more than that, however; the captain, when giving us
our instructions, hinting that he looked to us to fully justify him by
our services for all the trouble that he had taken in causing the
schooner to be fitted out. I think, however, that having put such a
dashing fellow as Ryan in command, he had very few misgivings upon this
point.

The _Barracouta_ and the _Felicidad_ sailed together on the evening of
the eighteenth of December, and, the captain having given Ryan a pretty
free hand, parted company off the shoals of Saint Ann; the schooner
keeping her luff and heading about south-south-west, while the brig bore
away on a south-east-by-south course for Cape Palmas; the idea being
that we should do better apart than together. We were to cruise for six
weeks, and at the end of that time, if unsuccessful, to rendezvous on
the parallel of six degrees south latitude and the meridian of twelve
degrees east longitude; or, in other words, some eighteen miles off the
mouth of the Congo. We were to remain on this spot twenty-four hours;
and if at the end of that time the brig had not appeared, we were to
proceed on a further cruise of six weeks, and then return to Sierra
Leone to replenish our stores and await further orders.

It was a glorious evening when we sailed; a moderate breeze was blowing
from the westward, pure, refreshing, and cool compared with the
furnace-like atmosphere in which we had been stewing for the previous
three weeks. The sky was without a cloud; the sea a delicate blue,
necked here and there with miniature foam-caps of purest white; while,
broad on our lee quarter, the high land about the settlement of Sierra
Leone, just dipping beneath the horizon, glowed rosy red in the light of
the sinking sun. It was an evening to make one's heart rejoice; such an
evening as can only be m