Page:Castaway on the Auckland Isles (IA castawayonauckla01musg).pdf/112

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The morning of the 19th July, 1865, broke fine and promising; at 8 a light air came from the southward, and at 11  we set sail from Camp Cove with the first squall of a sou'wester, which winds never blow with any degree of moderation for more than 12 hours, and invariably end in a hard gale; but by taking the very first of it I expected to have got some distance away before the strength of the gale would overtake us. We did not, how ever, get more than 20 miles from the island before we felt the full fury of a south-west gale, which continued until our arrival at Port Adventure, Stewart Island, on the morning of the 24th instant, after a miserable passage of five days and nights, during the whole of which time I stood upon my feet, holding on to a rope with one hand and pumping with the other. The boat was very leaky, and kept the pump almost constantly going. As my anxiety would not permit me to leave the deck, I performed this part of the work while the other two relieved each other at the helm. The wind, although fair, was so strong that we were obliged to lay-to nearly half the time, and the sea was constantly breaking over the little craft; and how she lived through it I scarcely know. I had not eaten an ounce of food from the time of leaving until we arrived, and only drank about half a pint of water; yet I felt no fatigue until the night before we landed, when I suddenly became quite exhausted, and lay down on the deck, over which there was no water washing for the first