“They are at their wit’s end. Then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses. He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. Then are they glad because they be quiet.”

So soon as our heartfelt congratulations had blended and been breathed out in prayer, hope became faintly rekindled in each yet conscious bosom of our distressed company; and with all our lingering energies of life, we made for the yet invisible shore. “The wrath of God lay hard upon us,” and, for so many days “we had been afflicted with all his waves,” that we felt as if all safety consisted only in escape from ocean’s “deeps.” And yet I was not without apprehension, that what we so fondly anticipated as the occasion of deliverance, might prove the fatal scene of our doom. The imminent danger of approaching a comparatively unknown coast, especially amid the heavy roll of Cape seas, and in such small boats as ours, demanded the exercise of every possible precaution, and suggested forebodings of no very pleasing issue. By my calculations we had been driven to the north of St. Helena Bay, which, by its bend, gave us forty miles more of sea to traverse than if we had been able to keep a more southerly course. On consulting a small fragment of chart—which one of the ladies had preserved for us, from the action of the sea, in her bosom,—I found, to our great relief, that the coast for which we were making was free of any outside shoals, and appeared favourable for our landing. We therefore made all speed to reach the shore if possible before nightfall; in this, however, we were disappointed; and a dense fog ahead hid the object of our solicitude from view, until night descended, and shrouded the surrounding landscape in darkness. The weather being moderate I resolved to prosecute our course throughout the night, and endeavour to effect our landing at daylight. The evening proved intensely cold, and we endured more acute suffering from the wind and spray, during those hours of darkness, than we had ever done before. This was probably caused by our preserving a more southerly course, and keeping the sheet hauled aft, which exposed us to the action of the sea, and sent the wind right down on us from the sail. Ere morning came a cold shiver had consequently seized every frame, and several persons in both boats were quite unable to stir.

About five o’clock the skiff hailed us, and communicated the melancholy tidings that the lad John Chisholm was dead. This was the first breach made among us, and it fell among our wasting company like a forerunner of our own fate. We were all closely “round the grave’s devouring mouth,” and now that it had found its first victim, we felt assured that others would follow. George Peat, in our boat, was only in life, and several persons in both boats were visibly sinking fast into the same unconscious state. I felt this visitation bitterly, as I was in full hope of reaching land in a few hours, and was sustained—by the signal mercy hitherto enjoyed—in the pleasing expectation that “God would have given us the lives of all who sailed with us.” But “He who doeth according to his will” had deemed it otherwise, and our hearts smote us to think that we had been preserved amid many perils, possibly only to perish on the threshold of deliverance.

Visions of land floated before our aching and anxious gaze throughout that weary night, and often we supposed that we could detect the dim outline of the headlands between the sea and sky. Still we trembled in uncertainty until morning came; but when the sun arose, it looked down upon us from behind the African hills, which stood in distinct outline before us at the distance of twelve miles. Then every heart bounded with hope, and the fading energies of life revived within us. We greeted the glad spectacle with our morning incense, and poured out our thanksgiving to God our Ebenezer. There was a beautiful propriety in the subject of our song, which then rose on the morning air, from the margin of that mighty ocean. It was Psalm xlvi.,

Scarcely had these sublime words passed our lips, ere we felt the awful importance and value of the holy sentiment. Our eyes could now detect a long line of frowning and iron-bound coast, fringed only with foam, and hoary with tremendous breakers. No friendly opening was visible, along that fearful barrier, and we looked in vain for some quiet creek amid the strife, where ocean might peacefully surrender the helpless charge which longed for escape from its horrors. As if to increase the solemnity of our condition, the wind at this time began to rise, and a heavy ground swell rolled in from the south-west, so that it needed no ordinary faith to prepare with calmness for the approaching crisis. But our only course was to face the danger, and trust to God for deliverance. I sent the small boat ahead, to examine the coast, if possible to find a creek for convenient landing, it being lighter than our boat, and having thafts for easy rowing, which we had not. I then sought to rally the spirits of my crew by a little exertion; getting out the oars, I exhorted them to try the exercise of rowing a little, and took a spell myself. With great difficulty I succeeded in inducing the most of them to make the attempt, and we felt the benefit of the effort, in a freer circulation of our blood, which served to relax our stiffened joints, and relieved us of the cold shivering. The breeze continued strong, and the sea was very heavy, until we approached within half a mile of the shore; when God—as if in sympathy with our situation, and preparing our way—subdued the wind, and made the strife of waters partially to subside. This gracious interposition made a deep impression upon us all, and we felt animated by it, in our very critical circumstances, as a foretaste of deliverance. At this time, a small rock which appeared to windward, presented to our eager eyes for a season the likeness of a sail; and we were delighted for the moment with the idea, that the coast which we were approaching might be inhabited; but a nearer view soon dispelled the illusion, and left us to a scene only of wild and desert solitude. Our small boat had now gone close in with the shore, in search of a landing-place, while we remained at a short distance on the outside, to wait for instructions. Our companions, in their eagerness to execute their survey, had unfortunately got themselves embayed, and in attempting to weather a projecting point, they failed; so that, in their extremity, one course only remained to them—for life or death they had to run for the beach. We, seeing this sudden movement, and supposing that our friends had discovered a favourable landing-place, bore up, and followed closely in their track. By signs and cries they attempted to warn us off; but we, mistaking their signals for encouragement, only pursued with increasing speed. It was a moment of intense and trembling interest to us all; death or deliverance hung upon the instant, and our hearts were fully alive to the immediate and awful alternative. Every faded and haggard countenance became flushed with eager excitement; every eye was strained to watch on either hand the impending fate; every hand grasped the gunwale with convulsive and trembling energy, and we held our breath in awe, as we dashed among the breakers, and plunged amid those fearful rocks and shoals. Surely the eye of heaven was watching over us in that unchosen and accidental landing-scene; for amidst many perils, it presented favourable opportunities for us—in a narrow channel among a cluster of small rocks, which was crowned with a sand beach—that no human foresight could have detected, and that was rare on that coast. Our small boat, indeed, was in extreme jeopardy; for in the midst of the breakers it struck upon a sharp rock, and some of the crew were thrown overboard by the shock. The sail, however, being still set, the next wave lifted it over, and the wind and sea being dead in shore, drove them right up to the beach, where, amid many difficulties, they effected a landing, and rescued their comrades in a state of great exhaustion. We in the larger boat were somewhat more fortunate; for “by the good hand of God upon us,” we made our way safely through a narrow channel, among the small rocks, without touching, until we came within a boat’s length of the beach, where we stuck fast upon a rock. There being deep water between us and the shore, we were all plunged overhead in our attempts to escape; but the ladies and children being assisted by the mate and seamen, were soon placed in safety; and “so it came to pass, that we escaped all safe to land.”

This signal deliverance—alike so gracious and remarkable—revealed in all its course and accomplishment, the direct and immediate agency of God, and could be attributed solely to his marked interposition and care. No human foresight or management could have availed to preserve so helpless a company in such extremities. With boats so frail, and means of sustenance so slender, nothing less than Omnipotent kindness could have sustained us throughout a voyage so disproportionate to all our preparations, and so encompassed with exceeding dangers. If our course, indeed, revealed no miracles, it was at least replete with special mercies; for had we been visited by a few days of head winds, or been overtaken by any of the fearful squalls so common in Cape seas, or even made our landfall on a bold and unbroken coast, not one of us would have survived in such a case to tell the tale of our disasters, and our last struggles would have been hid in the dark and terrible secrets of ocean, which, like the grave, gives no revelations. We had been led to look to God in all our way: even the good order and discipline which had been maintained, we felt we owed to his grace; and while we had used our best endeavours for our preservation, yet without his blessing, we were conscious that every exertion must have been without avail. Therefore, when God had “been better to us than our fears,” and “redeemed our lives from destruction,” our utmost gratitude was due to him, and we invite men “to see his hand,” and “to praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men.”

If it had been possible, at that solemn hour, to have forgotten or overlooked the signal kindness of heaven, even the continuous manifestations of Divine goodness to us must have, on the instant, rebuked such base ingratitude. Scarcely had the feet of our forlorn company been permitted to touch the shore, when the storm, which had lulled previously to our landing, burst forth with redoubled fury, and raged without intermission during the whole time that we remained in that place. The sea arose in ungovernable wrath, and as it lashed the shore, lifted our little boats upon its billows to a height of forty or fifty feet upon the beach. The narrow channel through which we had reached the shore in safety instantly became one scene of boiling surge, which would have shattered to pieces the proudest bark, and engulphed every living thing on board of her. Who could fail to discover the striking proof of a special and gracious Providence in this occurrence? If it be said that such sudden storms frequently occur in these latitudes, still the question arises,—why did that storm come at the precise moment when we were immediately out of the reach of its fury? There can be but one answer to this inquiry,—it was the good pleasure of him “who gave to the sea its decree, that it cannot pass, and who compasseth its waters with bounds.” Our company stood awe-stricken at the sight. We looked back upon the scene of destruction, from which we had so recently escaped, with mingled feelings of dismay and gratitude. Our deliverance, indeed, was not yet complete. Alas! who could tell whether,—“having escaped the sea,—vengeance might yet suffer us to live?” “The perils of the wilderness” lay before us in all their unknown horrors of toil, and thirst, and frightful famine. Still we had been delivered from “the floods that affrighted us,”—our bosoms swelled with the full sense of our rescue, and while we raised our song of deliverance and poured out our grateful prayers to God, there were many devout hearts in our circle who could appropriate the sentiment of the poet:—