Chap. XIV. —B. P.] FROM PORT ROYAL TO GREYTOWN. 227 
Eoadstead, between a fine American frigate and a 
corvette, and close to tlie English sloop of war which 
I had been sent to relieve. 
A slight cessation in the deluge disclosed to view 
the outlines of the place with which we were destined 
to become very familiar. The ship was riding in 
what sailors call the bight of the bay,—in other words 
near its centre; a dead lee shore, with the trade-wind 
blowing right home and bringing with it a sea which 
set all the vessels to work, rolling according to their 
lights; some with vigour and violence like the 1 Gorgon,’ 
others in a very stately and steady manner, like the 
TJ.S. fifty-gun frigate ( Sabine.’ 
On the extreme left was the point erroneously 
named on the charts Punta Arenas ; it was as low as 
it well could be, and covered with mangrove-bushes, 
which grew and flourished close down to the sea,— 
in point of fact looked as if they grew out of the sea. 
The mirage made the point appear as if it were bob¬ 
bing up and down in the queer dazzling light, caused by 
the struggles of the sun to peep through the damp at¬ 
mosphere. This singular appearance is very common 
during the rainy season in the West Indies. Further 
to the right, and south of us, running east and west, 
was the long sand-spit of the real Punta Arenas, nearly 
a mile in length and quite bare of vegetation, with 
the exception of two separate patches of shrubs just 
springing up. On the other side of this spit, which 
in fact forms the seaward face of the harbour (now, 
alas, only a lagoon), the city of Grey town is dimly 
discernible through the mist; we can just make out 
