been aloft more than ten minutes, when one of them fell overboard.  Why I should again have put my life in jeopardy, particularly after the warning of the last voyage, I know not.  I was perhaps vain of what I could do in the water.  I knew my powers; and with the hope of saving this unfortunate victim to the folly and cruelty of the captain, I plunged after him into the sea, feeling at the same time, that I was almost committing an act of suicide.  I caught hold of him, and for a time supported him; and, had the commonest diligence and seamanship been shewn, I should have saved him.  But the captain, it appeared, when he found I was overboard, was resolved to get rid of me, in order to save himself:  he made use of every difficulty to prevent the boat coming to me.  The poor man was exhausted:  I kept myself disengaged from him, when swimming round him; supported him occasionally whenever he was sinking; but, finding at last that he was irrecoverably gone—­for though I had a firm hold of him, he was going lower and lower—­and, looking up, perceiving I was so deep that the water was dark over my head, I clapped my knees on his shoulders, and, giving myself a little impetus from the resistance, rose to the surface.  So much was I exhausted, that I could not have floated half a minute more, when the boat came and picked me up.

The delay in heaving the ship to, I attributed to the scene I had witnessed the night before; and in this, I was confirmed by the testimony of the officers.  Having lost two men by his unseamanlike conduct, he would have added deliberate murder of a third, to save himself from the punishment which he knew awaited him.  He continued the same tyrannical conduct, and I had resolved that the moment we fell in with the admiral to write for a court-martial on this man, let the consequences be what they might:  I thought I should serve my country and the navy by ridding it of such a monster.

Several of the officers were under arrest, and notwithstanding the heat of their cabins in that warm climate, were kept constantly confined to them with a sentinel at the door.  In consequence of this cruel treatment, one of the officers became deranged.  We made Barbadoes, and running round Needham’s Point into Carlisle Bay, we saw to our mortification, that neither the admiral nor any ship of war was there, consequently our captain was commanding officer in the port.  Upon this, he became remarkably amiable, supposing if the evil day was put off, it would be dispensed with altogether; he treated me with particular attention, hoped we should have some fun ashore; as the admiral was not come in, we should wait for him; tired of kicking about at sea, he should take all his duds, with him, and bring himself to an anchor on shore, and not come afloat again till we saluted his flag.

Neither the first lieutenant nor myself believed one word of this; indeed, we always acted upon the exact reverse of what he said; and it was well we did so in this instance.  After we had anchored, he went ashore, and in about an hour returned, and stated that the admiral was not expected till next month; that he should, therefore, go and take up his quarters at Jemmy Cavan’s, and not trouble the ship any more until the admiral arrived; he then left us, taking his trunk and all his dirty linen, dirty enough it was.