—­’Tis mine to tell their tale of grief,
     Their constant peril and their scant relief;
     Their days of danger, and their nights of pain;
     Their manly courage, even when deem’d in vain;
     The sapping famine, rendering scarce a son
     Known to his mother in the skeleton;
     The ills that lessen’d still their little store,
     And starved even Hunger till he wrung no more;
     The varying frowns and favours of the deep,
     That now almost engulphs, then leaves to creep
     With crazy oar and shatter’d strength along
     The tide, that yields reluctant to the strong;
     Th’ incessant fever of that arid thirst
     Which welcomes, as a well, the clouds that burst
     Above their naked bones, and feels delight
     In the cold drenching of the stormy night,
     And from the outspread canvas gladly wrings
     A drop to moisten Life’s all-gasping springs;
     The savage foe escaped, to seek again
     More hospitable shelter from the main;
     The ghastly spectres which were doom’d at last
     To tell as true a tale of dangers past,
     As ever the dark annals of the deep
     Disclosed for man to dread or woman weep.

It is impossible not fully to accord with Bligh when he says, ’Thus happily ended, through the assistance of Divine Providence, without accident, a voyage of the most extraordinary nature that ever happened in the world,[11] let it be taken either in its extent, duration, or the want of every necessary of life.’  We may go further and say, it is impossible to read this extraordinary and unparalleled voyage, without bestowing the meed of unqualified praise on the able and judicious conduct of its commander, who is in every respect, as far as this extraordinary enterprise is concerned, fully entitled to rank with Parry, Franklin, and Richardson.  Few men, indeed, were ever placed for so long a period in a more trying, distressing, and perilous situation than he was; and it may safely be pronounced, that, to his discreet management of the men and their scanty resources, and to his ability as a thorough seaman, eighteen souls were saved from imminent and otherwise inevitable destruction, it was not alone the dangers of the sea, in an open boat, crowded with people, that he had to combat, though they required the most consummate nautical skill, to be enabled to contend successfully against them; but the unfortunate situation, to which the party were exposed, rendered him subject to the almost daily murmuring and caprice of people less conscious than himself of their real danger.  From the experience they had acquired at Tofoa of the savage disposition of the people against the defenceless boat’s crew, a lesson was learned how little was to be trusted, even to the mildest of uncivilized people, when a conscious superiority was in their hands.  A striking proof of this was experienced in the unprovoked attack