Page:Castaway on the Auckland Isles (IA castawayonauckla01musg).pdf/35

Rh gun in the boat, or else I should have shot the big seal. We salted all the meat excepting two seals, which we kept for present use; and this afternoon I found a young seal, not more than a month or six weeks old, sitting shivering at the end of the house. I took him in, and some of them wanted to keep him; but this of course we could not do, as he would eat nothing but fish, and not even that yet; so we killed him. I think he had lost his mother, for he was very low in flesh and had nothing at all in his inside. So this is more fresh meat. God is certainly good in sending us plenty to eat. I hope and pray that He will soon send some one in here that will take us away.

The 'Grafton' is breaking up fast to-day. There is a heavy surf on with the gale. Her decks are coming up. The barometer has been very high throughout the week; it has not been below 29⋅50 until to-day, when it fell, from 10 o'clock last night till 9 o'clock this morning, from 29⋅58 to 28 at 9 The thermometer has been about 48°, till to-day it is 47°.

Sunday, March 13, 1864.—My heart beats fast to-night as I sit down to write, somewhat similar to what it might do if I was about writing a love letter. I know that many a bitter tear has been shed for me by this time, and most likely to-day, as this is the end of another dreary month since I left those I loved so much; and how many more must pass, or how they will pass them until we meet again, or whether we shall ever meet again on earth—Heaven only knows. These thoughts, and such as these, which now prey continually on my mind, are maddening. I feel as if I was gradually consumed by an inward fire. I strive, by occupying my hands as much as possible, to dispel these sad feelings; but it is utterly impossible. A melancholy is getting hold of me; I am getting as thin as a lantern, and some disordered fluttering and heavy beating of the heart, which causes a faintness, is troubling me. I have felt this before, but only on one particular occasion, and that is some time ago. Were it not for the hope that