ON SABLE ISLAND. 25 



more than two years, during which she had made eleven trips to Halifax ; also four large 

 copper-fastened boats and two small ones for the use of the establishment, and twenty-seven 

 buildings of diflerent sizes. Eight two-wheeled carts had been constructed and two old ones 

 thoroughly repaired, thirty thousand shingles manufactured and two thousand leet of boards 

 sawn for the use of the establishment, two large flagstafFs erected and one small one, 

 direction-boards set up in various places, and eight or ten acres inclosed with fences. They 

 had raised during that time about two thousand bushels of vegetables, five thousand six 

 hundred pounds of pork, fourteen thousand pounds of beef, collected four hundred and 

 twenty cords of wood, and made seven thousand copper nails. 



In like manner, he reports in the year 1844 the work done during the previous seven 

 years. There had been wrecked during that time upon the island ten ships, two brigs and 

 four schooners, from which had been saved one hundred and thirteen passengers and one 

 hundred and seventy-nine seamen, with their baggage. There had been shijjped, as produce 

 of the island, fifty-eight horses, thirty-four casks of oil and twenty-seven barrels of skins. 

 There had been raised one thousand eight hundred bushels of vegetables, eight thousand 

 pounds of pork and thirteen thousand of beef. A hundred thousand shingles had been 

 manufactured, twenty-six thousand feet of boards sawn and tour hundred cords of wood 

 collected. Of the improvements he mentions that he had built three warehouses for wrecked 

 goods and four small buildings for various purposes, and assisted in putting up two large 

 buildings for castaway seamen ; that he had erected one flagstaff sixty-five feet high, with 

 k)ok-out, and built a new lifeljoat, etc. 



About the same time he mentions that he had constructed " a portable wharf of fifty 

 feet long, standing on two pair of wheels, with a capstan to heave it out of the water, and a 

 house built over it." We have no douljt that this was a most ingenious construction, but 

 we never hear of any attempt to put it to practical use. 



From 1844 to 1847 the number of lives saved was one hundred and thirty-eight, making 

 altogether seven hundred and thirteen from the time of his ap[)ointment in 1830. 



With these known wrecks there were the usual number of unknown, indicated by such 

 records in his journal as the following : 



"April 6. — A man went round the northwest bar and found a new jinnip bflonging to 

 some small vessel, the upper part painted white, also part of a new chair, l)ottom painted 

 black-mahogany colour, with bright yellow rings round the legs. 



" loth. — A boat came ashore on the northeast bar having in it five seal gaffs, two pea- 

 jackets, two pieces of boiled pork, two spruce oars having J. Herald branded on them." 

 (This probably had merely gone adrift from some fishing vessel.) 



" 27th. — Pound a man's leather cap trimmed with sealskin." 



One of the most interesting incidents of Capt. Darby's incumbency was the saving of a 

 captain and crew of a vessel by the casting of oil upon the troubled waters. We give the 

 particulars, condensed from a report of his at the time : 



" All of a sudden we saw an object to the north side dead to windward, which we at 

 first thought was a large bird, but shortly after discovered that it was a sail, distant five or 

 six miles, and that she was running down right before this tremendous gale dead on a lee 

 shore." ..." We could see that she was a schooner with a close-reefed mainsail set, 

 steering directly for our flagstaff." . . . "The sea was breaking everywhere off the 

 north side as far as the eye could see, and it appeared almost incredible that any vessel could 



Sec. II., 1804. 4. 



