76 Voyage of the Novara. 



escape to sliore by swimming. The smaller, or jolly-boat, 

 returned to the ship with two of her crew to fetch assistance 

 for these woe-begone wights. One of the latter, who coolly 

 spoke of the accident as a ^'"piccola disgrazietta^''''* with the same 

 breath informed us that almost all the instruments, note-books, 

 and implements of the chase which had been taken on board, 

 were irretrievably gone. Another quarter-boat was despatched 

 to bring off our shipwrecked companions, who meanwhile re- 

 mained on the shore in anything but enviable plight, soaked 

 to the skin, hungry and thirsty, and busily employed in 

 fishing u]3 some few of the articles that had been overturned 

 into the water. At last both boats got safely back in com- 

 pany about midnight, but under such circumstances that it 

 was out of the question to think of prosecuting the examina- 

 tion that had been commenced. We now lay a course for 

 the southern bay of Great Nicobar, where, shortly after 9 p.m. of 

 the 24th March, we cast anchor near the little stream called 

 '' Galatea" by the Danish expedition. The midshipman in- 

 trusted with the commission of selecting the most suitable spot 

 to disembark, returned after several hours' absence, with the 

 little consolatory intelligence, that along the entire reach of 

 coast which he had examined, there was but one solitary spot 

 at which it was possible to land without danger from a boat 

 of European construction. In the course of the day we re- 

 ceived numbers of natives on board ; among the rest, one man 



* Most of the Austrian sailors are from the Adriatic coast, and accordingly speak 

 an Italian patois. 



