136 A VOYAGE TO [South Coast. 
1802. been last seen, so that it would be carried to seaward in the first in- 
Sunday 2i'. stance ; and no more than two out of the eight people being at all 
expert in swimming, it was much to be feared that most of them 
would be lost.* 
Monday 22. At daybreak I got the ship under way, and steered across 
Thorny Passage, over to the main land, in the direction where the 
cutter had been seen ; keeping an officer at the mast head, with a 
glass, to look out for her. There were many strong ripplings, and 
some uncommonly smooth places vvhere a boat, which was sent to 
sound, had 12 fathoms. We passed to the northward of all these ; 
and seeing a small cove with a sandy beach, steered in and anchored 
in 10 fathoms, sandy bottom; the main land extending from north- 
half-west, round by the west and south to east-south-east, and the 
open space being partly sheltered by the northern islands of the 
passage 
A boat was despatched in search of the lost cutter, and pre- 
sently returned towing in the wreck, bottom upward ; it was stove 
* This evening, Mr. Fowler told me a circumstance which I thought extraordinary ; 
and it afterwards proved to be more so. Whilst we were lying at Spithead, Mr. Thistle 
was one day waiting on shore, and having nothing else to do he went to a certain old 
man, named Pine, to have his fortune told. The cunning man informed him that he 
was going out a long voyage, and that the ship, on arriving at her destination, would be 
joined by another vessel. That such was intended, he might have learned privately ; but 
he added, that Mr. Thistle would be lost before the other vessel joined. As to the man- 
ner of his loss the magician refused to give any information. My boat's crew, hearing what 
Mr. Thistle said, went also to consult the wise man ; and after the prefatory information 
of a long voyage, were told that they would be shipwrecked, but not in the ship they were 
going out in : whether they would escape and return to England, he was not permitted 
to reveal. 
This tale Mr. Thistle had often told at the mess table ; and I remarked with some pain 
in a future part of the voyage, that every time my boat's crew went to embark with me 
in the Lady Nelson, there was some degree of apprehension amongst them that the time 
of the predicted shipwreck was arrived. I make no comment upon this story, but re- 
commend a commander, if possible, to prevent any of his crew from consulting fortune 
tellers. 
