THE LABRADOR JOURNAL 413 



d'Or, but our anchor stuck into a rock, and just as we 

 might have sailed, a heavy fog came on, so here we are. 

 July 26. I did not write last night because we were at 

 sea and the motion was too disagreeable, and my mind 

 was as troubled as the ocean. We left Baie de Portage 

 before five in the morning, with a good breeze, intending 

 to come to at Chevalier's settlement, forty-seven miles; 

 but after sailing thirty, the wind failed us, it rained and 

 blew, with a tremendous sea which almost shook the masts 

 out of our good vessel, and about eight we were abreast 

 of Bonne Esperance; but as our pilot knew as much of 

 this harbor as he did of the others, which means nothing 

 at all, our captain thought prudent to stand off and pro- 

 ceed to Bras d'Or. The coast we have followed is like 

 that we have hitherto seen, crowded with islands of all 

 sizes and forms, against which the raging waves break in 

 a frightful manner. We saw few birds, with the excep- 

 tion of Gannets, which were soaring about us most of the 

 day feeding on capelings, of which there were myriads. I 

 had three Uria troile thrown overboard alive to observe 

 their actions. Two fluttered on top of the water for 

 * twenty yards or so, then dove, and did not rise again for 

 fully a hundred yards from the vessel. The third went 

 in head-foremost, like a man diving, and swam under the 

 surface so smoothly and so rapidly that it looked like a 

 fish with wings. At daylight we found ourselves at the 

 mouth of Bras d'Or harbor, where we are snugly moored. 

 Our pilot not knowing a foot of the ground, we hoisted 

 our ensign, and Captain Billings came to us in his Hamp- 

 ton boat and piloted us in. Bras d'Or is the grand ren- 

 dezvous of almost all the fishermen that resort to this 

 coast for codfish. We found here a flotilla of about one 

 hundred and fifty sail, principally fore-and-aft schooners, 

 a few pickaxes, etc., mostly from Halifax and the eastern 

 portions of the United States. There was a life and stir 

 about this harbor which surprised us after so many weeks 



