38 
man to describe or human imagination to 
conceive a scene of more transcendent and 
complicated horror. To fill up the measure 
of our calamities, about the hour of mid- 
night, a sudden shift of wind threw the 
ship into the trough of the sea, which 
struck her aft, tore away the rudder, 
started the stern post from the hauden 
ends, and shattered the whole of her 
stern frame. The pumps were immedi- 
ately sounded; and in the course of a few 
minutes the water had increased to four 
feet, I immediately ordered one gang to 
work the pumps, and the remainder were 
employed in getting up rice out of the run 
of the ship, and heaving it overboard, in 
order, if possible, to get at the leak. After 
three or four hundred bags were thrown 
into the sea, we got at the principal leak, 
and found the water pouring into her with 
astonishing rapidity. In order therefore 
to decrease as much as possible the influx 
of water, we thrust into the aperture sheets, 
shirts, jackets, bales of muslin, and every 
thing of the like description we could find. 
Had not these exertions been attended with 
