284 CAPTAIN CARTWRIGHT'S 



died on September 16tli] and I, embarked in the 

 evening. 



Wednes., October 27, 1779. At lialf past seven 

 this morning we began to heave up the anchor, 

 but it was so firmly fixed in the ground, which is 

 tough black clay, that it was with the utmost dif- 

 ficulty, and not without the assistance of all the 

 men from the shore, we could weigh it; we broke 

 a couple of purchasing bars in the operation. At 

 nine we got to sea through the eastern passage, 

 with a strong gale at north-west; there being a 

 high sea running, and the ship extremely deep, 

 and too much by the head, she plunged into it in 

 such manner, that it made quite a free passage 

 over her. The gale kept gradually increasing un- 

 til the next evening, by which time it became a 

 very heavy one, and continued so for twenty-four 

 hours, which carried us into the latitude of Funk 

 Island, and as we judged, about fourteen leagues 

 to the eastward of it. All that time it froze so 

 severely, that everything Avas solid ice, as high up 

 the rigging as the spray of the sea reached: but 

 now both wind and frost abated, and we had after- 

 wards mild, foggy weather, with light baffling 

 winds, until the fourth of November, when we had 

 a fresh breeze at south-west, with which we got 

 safe to an anchor in the harbour of KSt. John's, in 

 Newfoundland, where I went to get convoy. I 

 found lying here Admiral Edwards, the governor 

 of Newfoundland, in the Romney man of war of 

 sixty guns; the Surprise and L^^corne frigates; 

 the Marten and Cygnet sloops; and the Wildcat 



