A raft had been constructed during the previous day, upon which the small quantity of provisions they had been able to collect, together with some of the baggage of the embassy, and clothes and bedding of the officers and men, had been transported to the shore.

In the course of the forenoon, Captain Maxwell thought it right to confer with Lord Amherst as to his further movements; he accordingly quitted the wreck, and went on shore.  He left the vessel in charge of Mr. Hick, the first lieutenant, with orders that every effort should be made to get at the provisions and the water, and that a boat should remain by the wreck for the safety of the men in case of any emergency.  Captain Maxwell reached the shore about half-past eleven A.M., and we may imagine the bitterness of his distress on finding the ambassador, surrounded by his suite, and the officers and men of the Alceste, in the midst of a pestilential saltwater marsh.

The scene is well described by Mr. McLeod.  ’The spot in which our party were situated was sufficiently romantic, but seemed, at the same time, the abode of ruin and of havoc.  Few of its inhabitants (and among the rest the ambassador) had now more than a shirt or a pair of trousers on.  The wreck of books, or, as it was not unaptly termed, ’a literary manure,’ was spread about in all directions; whilst parliamentary robes, court dresses, and mandarin habits, intermixed with check shirts and tarry jackets, were hung around in wild confusion on every tree.’

The situation in which Captain Maxwell was placed was, indeed, a most trying one, and such he felt it to be, for, from the lowest seaman to the ambassador himself, every one looked to him for relief and direction in his perilous position.  Captain Maxwell was fully competent to meet the emergency; and, said he, ’I had the consolation left me, to feel with confidence that all would follow my advice, and abide by my decision, whatever it might be.’

His first care was for the safety of Lord Amherst; and in a short conference with his excellency and Mr. Ellis, the second commissioner, it was arranged that the embassy should proceed to Batavia in the barge and cutter, with a guard of marines to defend the boats from any attack of the pirates.  Mr. Ellis promised that if they arrived safely at Batavia, he would himself return, in the first vessel that should put off, to the assistance of those who remained on the island.

A small quantity of provisions, and nine gallons of water, was all that could be spared from their very scanty store; but at sunset every heart was exhilarated by hope and sympathetic courage, on seeing the ambassador strip, and wade off to the boats, with as much cheerfulness as if he had stepped into them under a salute.  At seven o’clock, the barge, under the charge of Lieutenant Hoppner, and the cutter, commanded by Mr. Mayne, the master, containing in all forty-seven persons, took their departure for Batavia, accompanied by the anxious thoughts and good wishes of their fellow-sufferers, who were left to encounter new dangers.