164 
THE END OF HOPE, 
Kong, where we arrived on the 13tli of February, 1855, 
and found the Vincennes alone at her moorings. We 
looked with straining eyes and sinking hearts for the 
well-known hull and spai’s of the devoted brig. They 
were nowhere to be seen. We sighed and closed our 
glasses with a shudder. The Porpoise tvas lost 
We found that the’ Vincennes herself had passed 
through an unusually severe cruise during our separa- 
tion; and as the unfortunate Porpoise had kept company 
with her up to a certain time, since when she has not 
been heard of, I make the following extract from a letter 
lately received from Lieutenant John M. Brooke, of the 
Vincennes, in regard to the manner in which they sepa- 
rated, &c. ; and I am sorry to say to the friends of those 
who were lost in her, that this exti’act contains all we 
know of her melancholy end ; — 
“The facts relating to the Vincennes and the Porpoise, 
and the fate of the latter, are simply these: — 
“The two vessels in company were struggling with the 
northeast monsoons in the China Sea. Occasionally the 
veering wind and changing barometer indicated the pas- 
sage of a cyclone : the increasing fury of the wind and 
these indications governed the courses of the vessels. At 
length they found themselves between Formosa and the 
main, and, during the night of the 20th of September, 
they held on near mid-channel ; but in the morning the 
Vincennes, then to leeward, bore up for the Bashee pas- 
sage. It was presumed that the Porpoise would follow. 
While the Vincennes was thus running before the wind, 
towing hawsers astern to break the sea should she cross 
the banks, the Porpoise was enveloped in a driving mist 
