Captain Mitchell now made signals of distress, and our long-boat, was sent off with a good supply of water, and plenty of fish and other refreshments:  And, as the long-boat could not be wanted, the cockswain had positive orders from the commodore to return immediately.  But next day proving stormy, and the boat not appearing, we much feared she was lost, which would have been an irretrievable misfortune to us all.  We were relieved, however, from this anxiety on the third day after, by the joyful appearance of her sails on the water, on which the cutter was sent to her assistance, and towed her alongside in a few hours, when we found that the long-boat had taken in six of the Gloucester’s sick men, to bring them on shore, two of whom had died in the boat.  We now learnt that the Gloucester was in a most dreadful condition, having scarcely a man in health on board, except the few she had received from us.  Numbers of their sick were dying daily, and it appeared, had it not been for the last supply sent by our long-boat, that both the healthy and diseased must all have perished for want of water.  This calamitous situation was the more terrifying, as it appeared to be without remedy; for the Gloucester had already spent a month in fruitless endeavours to fetch the bay, and was now no farther advanced than when she first made the island.  The hopes of her people of ever succeeding were now worn out, by the experience of its difficulty; and, indeed, her situation became that same day more desperate than ever, as we again lost sight of her, after receiving our last supply of refreshments, so that we universally despaired of her ever coming to anchor.

Thus was this unhappy vessel bandied about, within a few leagues of her intended harbour, while the near neighbourhood of that place, and of these circumstances which could alone put an end to the calamities under which her people laboured, served only to aggravate their distress, by torturing them with a view of the relief they were unable to reach.  She was at length delivered from this dreadful situation at a time when we least expected it:  For, after having lost sight of her for several days, we were joyfully surprised, in the morning of the 23d July, to see her open the N.W. point of the bay with a flowing sail, when we immediately dispatched what boats we had to her assistance, and within an hour from our first perceiving her, she anchored safe within us in the bay.

We were now more particularly convinced of the importance of the assistance and refreshments we had repeatedly sent her, and how impossible it must have been for a single man of her crew to have survived, had we given less attention to their wants.  For, notwithstanding the water, vegetables, and fresh provisions with which we had supplied them, and the hands we had sent to assist in navigating the ship, by which the fatigue of her own people had been greatly diminished, their sick relieved, and the mortality abated; notwithstanding