A new event, for every thing was an event for wretches for whom the universe was reduced to a flooring of a few toises in extent, who were the sport of the winds and waves, as they hung suspended over the abyss; an event then happened which happily diverted our attention from the horrors of our situation.  All at once a white butterfly, of the species so common in France, appeared fluttering over our heads, and settled on our sail.  The first idea which, as it were, inspired each of us made us consider this little animal as the harbinger, which brought us the news of a speedy approach to land, and we snatched at this hope with a kind of delirium of joy.  But it was the ninth day that we passed upon the raft; the torments of hunger consumed our entrails; already some of the soldiers and sailors devoured, with haggard eyes, this wretched prey, and seemed ready to dispute it with each other.  Others considered this butterfly as a messenger of heaven, declared that they took the poor insect under their protection, and hindered any injury being done to it.  We turned our wishes and our eyes towards the land, which we so ardently longed for, and which we every moment fancied we saw rise before us.  It is certain that we could not be far from it:  for the butterflies continued, on the following days, to come and flutter about our sail, and the same day we had another sign equally positive:  for we saw a (goeland) flying over our raft.  This second visitor did not allow us to doubt of our being very near to the African shore, and we persuaded ourselves that we should soon be thrown upon the coast by the force of the currents.  How often did we then, and in the following days, invoke a tempest to throw us on the coast, which, it seemed to us, we were on the point of touching.

The hope which had just penetrated the inmost recesses of our souls, revived our enfeebled strength, and inspired us with an ardour, an activity, of which we should not have thought ourselves capable.  We again had recourse to all the means which we had before employed, to catch fish.  Above all, we eagerly longed for the (goeland), which appeared several times tempted to settle on the end of our machine.  The impatience of our desire increased, when we saw several of its companions join it, and keep following us till our deliverance; but all attempts to draw them to us were in vain; not one of them suffered itself to be taken by the snares we had laid for them.  Thus our destiny, on the fatal raft, was to be incessantly tossed between transitory illusions and continued torments, and we never experienced an agreeable sensation without being, in a manner, condemned to atone for it, by the anguish of some new suffering, by the irritating pangs of hope always deceived.

Another care employed us this day; as soon as we were reduced to a small number, we collected the little strength we had remaining; we loosened some planks on the front of the raft, and with some pretty long pieces of wood, raised in the center a kind of platform, on which we reposed:  all the effects which we had been able to collect, were placed upon it, and served to render it less hard; besides, they hindered the sea from passing with so much facility through the intervals between the different pieces of the raft; but the waves came across, and sometimes covered us entirely.