On September 10, early in the morning, we left Ysabel Island, having the schooner 'Southern Cross'
in tow, which we subsequently bore away
from after mutual adieus, and bent our
course towards Eramanga a distant of 900 miles.
On the 13th
September we were disturbed by an awkward accident. A man fell overboard from
the main chains when we were going at a brisk rate. A life-buoy was thrown over
to him, and it was a great comfort to
see the unfortunate fellow contrive to get
hold of it. A boat was lowered ; he was soon brought on deck safe and sound.
One evening
a sailor caught a good sized sea bird in the
jib-boom where he had perched with two others. It was a white and brown web-footed bird, with a long
pointed beak, and a neck thick in proportion
to the size of its body; the eyes were
large with a yellow ring round the iris
of each ; its upper mandible was hooked a little at the point. Another day a 'man-of-war bird ' of good size
was caught, having fallen into the
bowsprit netting. It was, I believe, the
Tachypetes Aquila of the South Pacific.
On September
20, soon after we sat down to dinner, the
wind shifted all at once to south ;
the ship was taken aback by the lee in a heavy squall with rain, and we went astern sometime. The
officer of the watch turned up the other
watch on deck. One would have noticed
nothing in the cabin to indicate what had happened had it not been for the noise made by the men
on deck. Part of the mast had gone
overboard ; it broke in three pieces. The
men got very wet, as well as the main deck and
hammocks, and must have passed an unpleasant night.
The next day an enormous quantity of rain fell, and the day after there were again some squalls. Calms on the following days induced the
Commodore to have recourse to steam, and
a lucky thing was it for us that there
were on board 100 tons of coal ; for without that we should have spent a considerable time in
reaching our destination. On September 25 a magnificent sunrise lit up
for us the mountains of Eramanga, and at
a still greater distance on our
starboard bow the hills of Tanna.
