170 
VOYAGE TO THE 
CHAP, earlier than was expected, and blew with great violence; two days were, 
notwithstanding, passed under favourable circumstances, and the adven- 
began to look for the high land of Maitea, an island between Chain 
Island and Otaheite, and to anticipate the pleasures which the success- 
ful termination of their voyage would afford them, when their progress 
was delayed by a calm, the precursor of a storm, which rose suddenly 
from an unfavourable quarter, dispersed the canoes, and drove them 
away before it. In this manner they drifted for several days ; but on 
the return of fine weather, having a fortnight's provision remaining, they 
again resolutely sought their destination, but a second gale drove them 
still farther back than the first, and lasted so long that they became 
exhausted. Thus many days were past ; their distance from home hourly 
increasing ; the sea continually washing over the canoe, to the great 
discomfiture of the women and children ; and their store of provision 
dwindled to the last extremity. A long calm, and, what was to them 
even worse, hot dry weather, succeeded the tempest, and drove them to 
a state of despair. From the description we may imagine their canoe 
alone, and becalmed on the ocean ; the crew, perishing with thirst be- 
neath the fierce glare of a tropical sun, hanging exhausted over their 
paddles; children looking to their parents for support, and mothers 
deploring their inability to afford them assistance. Every means of 
quenching their thirst were resorted to ; some drank the sea water, and 
others bathed in it, or poured it over their heads ; but the absence of 
fresh water in the torrid zone cannot be compensated by such substi- 
tutes. Day after day, those who were able extended their gourds to 
heaven in supplication for rain, and repeated their prayers, but in vain ; 
the fleeey cloud floating high in the air indicated only an extension 
of their suffering : distress in its most aggravated form had at length 
reached its height, and seventeen persons fell victims to its horrors. 
The situation of those who remained may readily be imagined, 
though their fate would never have been known to us, had not Pro- 
vidence at this critical moment wrought a change in their favour. 1 he 
sky, which for some time had been perfectly serene, assumed an aspect 
which at any other period would have filled our sufferers with appre- 
hension ; but, on the present occasion, the tropical storm, as it ap- 
