INSUBORDINATION AND SELFISHNESS. 77 



command, the plan would have been, as was afterwards proved, quite practicable. The raft 

 was immediately constructed, principally from the spars removed from the vessel as 

 before mentioned. 



Various efforts were made to get the Medusa off the sandbank, and at one time she 

 swung entirely, and turned her head to sea. She was, in fact, almost afloat, and a tow-line 

 applied in the usual way would have taken her into deep water ; but this familiar expedient 

 was never even proposed. Or, even had she been lightened by throwing overboard a part 

 of her stores temporarily which could have been done without serious harm to many article* 

 she might have been saved. Half-measures were tried, and even these were not acted 

 on with perseverance. During the next night there was a strong gale and heavy swell, 

 and the Medusa heeled over with much violence; the keel broke in two, the rudder was 

 unshipped, and, still holding to the stern-post by the chains, dashed against the vessel and 

 beat a hole into the captain's cabin, through which the waves entered. It was at this time 

 that the first indications of that unruly spirit which afterwards produced so many horrors 

 appeared among the soldiers, who assembled tumultuously on deck, and could hardly be quieted. 

 Next morning there were seven feet of water in the hold, and the pumps could not be 

 worked, so that it was resolved to quit the vessel without delay. Some bags of biscuit 

 were taken from the bread-room, and some casks of wine got ready to put on the boats 

 and raft. But there was an utter want of management, and several of the boats only 

 received twenty-five pounds of biscuit and no wine, while the raft had a quantity of wine 

 and no biscuit. To avoid confusion, a list had been made the evening before, assigning 

 to each his place. No one paid the slightest attention to it, and no one of those in 

 authority tried to enforce obedience to it. It was a case of " Sauve qui pent ! " with a 

 vengeance : a disorderly and disgraceful scramble for the best places and an utter and 

 total disregard for the wants of others. 



It is, and always has been, a point of honour for the officers to be among the very 

 last to leave (except, of course, where their presence might be needed in the boats), and 

 the captain to be the very last. Here, the captain was among the first to scramble over 

 the side ; and his twelve-oared barge only took off twenty -eight persons, when it would have 

 easily carried many more. A large barge took the colonial governor and his family, and the 

 governor's trunks. His boat wanted for nothing, and would have accommodated ten or more 

 persons than it took. When several of the unfortunate crew swam off and begged to be 

 taken in, they were kept off with drawn swords. The raft * took the larger part of the 

 soldiers, and had in all on board one hundred and fifty persons. The captain coolly proposed 

 to desert some sixty of the people still on board, and leave them to shift for themselves; 

 but an officer who threatened to shoot him was the means of making him change his mind, 



* The raft is described in the original work on the shipwreck of the Medusa substantially as follows : It was 

 Composed of topmasts, yards, planks, the boom, &c., lashed strongly together; two topmasts formed the sides, and 

 four other masts, of the same length as the former, were placed in the centre, planks being nailed on them. Long 

 timbers were placed across the raft, adding considerably to its strength; these projected about ten feet on each side. 

 There was a rail along the sides, to keep those on board from falling into the sea. Its height being only about a 

 foot and a half, it was constantly under water, though this could easily have been remedied, by raising a second 

 floor a foot or two above it. Two of the ship's yards, joined to the extremities of the sides, at one end met in front- 

 and formed a bow. Its length was sixty feet, and breadth about twenty. 



