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22 sinking vessel. A month after, this is on the 20th of December, these unfortunate people arrived at the Isle of Ducie, where they stopped eight days: but not finding any provisions there, they endeavoured to teach the continent of South America, leaving, however, three of their companions upon the island. A short time after this the two boats separated; and one of them, which had only three men in her, met sixty days after their shipwreck, an American vessel, which took them on board. It was not till ninety-six days after their departure from the island of Duice, that the other boat had the good fortune to meet with a vessel: but there were only two persons on board, the Captain and the cabin boy. Famine had reduced them to the horrible necessity of eating each other! Eight times they drew lots, and eight victims were sacrificed to the hunger of their surviving companiouscompanions [sic]. The lot had been already drawn which condemned the boy to the same fate, when he and the Captain discovered the vessel which saved them. An English vessel, on her way to Port Jackson, in New Holland, touched at the Island of Ducie. A gun having been fired, the crew soon afterwards saw the three men who had been left there come out of the wood. A boat was sent to bring them on board the ship.

A serious confabulation took place one fine forenoon, at a sea port not fifty miles from Tay