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 are heated over the fire or in an oven. As a luxury, pickled oysters are taken for stewing, which eat as good as if then opened alive from the shell.

30th.—At eight last night came on a strong breeze from S. W. carrying us from 8 to 10 miles an hour, and increasing through this day, to a gale of unprecedented fury. Lat. 36°, long. 68°, by a correct lunar observation. At five this evening, the affectionate mother of one dear and only child was, by the violent rolling of the ship, impelled overboard, and sunk to rise no more, being buried instantly in a huge billow. She was a native {23} of Owhyhee, and is deeply lamented by all on board, who had shared in her kindness, for she was milk and honey to all during a long passage from Asia. But what pen can depict the mad, shrieking sorrows of her now motherless child, who witnessed this sad catastrophe, and who became a poor orphan, dependent on the humanity of the captain or owner of the Hamilton! By force only was the frantic child prevented from plunging into its mother's grave. Its agonies made the following night memorable. The gale, too, continued with unabated fury, ready to blast all hope. At midnight, we found ourselves in the midst of the gulf stream, a current 60 miles broad, and running eastward, in a calm, three miles an hour. Here, until and after the dawn of day, we experienced severe thunder and lightning, forming altogether a horrible tempest; a perfectly novel scene, such as I had never witnessed. Up all night.

31st.—The morning dawns, with a most dismal frowning aspect; the air being full of blue fire and crashing thunder, and the sea rising and falling over, on, and around us, like swelling mountains of liquid fire. The captain apparently bewildered, not knowing how to act, and seemingly overwhelmed with doubt and indecision.