Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2.djvu/508

494

obtained on the 21st, at the entrance of the English Channel; but it then blew a gale of wind from the westward, and obliged us to lie to on this, as it did on the following night; and it was greatly feared that the cutter would be driven on the coast of France, near the Casket rocks. In the morning of the 23rd, the wind being more moderate, we made sail to the northward, and got sight of the Bill of Portland; and at five in the evening came to an anchor in Studland Bay, off the entrance of Pool Harbour, after a run from St. Helena of six weeks; which in an indifferent sailing vessel, very leaky, and excessively ill found, must be considered an excellent passage.

Captain Parkinson and lieutenant Robb went off the same night with their despatches; and next morning we ran through the Needles and came to at Spithead, where the prize brig, from which we had been long separated, had just before dropped her anchor. I went on shore to wait upon admiral sir Roger Curtis, and the same evening set off for London; having been absent from England nine years and three months, and nearly four years and a half without intelligence from any part of my connexions.

The account of the Investigator's voyage, and of the events resulting from it is concluded; but there is one or two circumstances which the naval reader may probably desire to see further explained. A regulation adopted at the Admiralty forbids any officer to be promoted whilst a prisoner, upon the principle apparently, that officers in that situation have almost always to undergo a court martial, which cannot be done until they are set at liberty. My case was made subject to this regulation, although it required no court martial; and was moreover so different to that of prisoners in general, that nothing similar perhaps ever occurred. In consequence of my French passport, not only was the possibility of reaping any advantage from the war done away, but the liberation on parole or by exchange, granted to all others in Mauritius, was refused for years, the passport removing me from the class of prisoners of war; yet one