Page:Twenty years before the mast - Charles Erskine, 1896.djvu/48

 We weighed anchor on the nth of October and stood for Patty’s Overfalls, as laid down on the chart. In the afternoon we spoke the Danish brig Lion, Rio de Janeiro. We also spoke the ship Crusader, seventy-five days from Bombay. She was in need of medical aid, and we sent a surgeon on board. It also afforded us no small pleasure to supply them with fruit and vegetables. On the 9th we reached the supposed position of Patty’s Overfalls. We saw nothing of them, although we sailed over several tide-rips. We sounded every half-hour with our deep-sea line, but did not touch bottom. We now cruised for the Warleys. The English, French, and other vessels had reported shoals off the African coast. The squadron was spread as before, in open order, covering  as much space as possible, and we passed over the locality mentioned, but saw no appearance of shallow water  or danger of any kind. While here we witnessed a brilliant display of falling stars, some sixty or eighty falling in a minute. They were large and brilliant, and seemed to shoot in all directions from the constellations of  Gemini, Taurus, Orion, Leo, and Pleiades. It was a wonderful sight.

Nothing more of importance occurred until near the close of November, when land was reported from the  lookout aloft. In a few hours we caught sight of the richly variegated tints resting like a halo over the tall  summit of Cape Frio, forty miles north of Rio de Janeiro. Favored by a light wind from the sou’east, we entered the harbor under full press of canvas. As we proceeded, we saw our own flag floating to the breeze from the mizzen peak of that magnificent specimen of naval