Though this accident was sufficiently displeasing to the people, it yet awed them for a considerable time to their duty, and rendered them more submissive to the authority of the captain.  But at last, towards the middle of October, when, the long-boat was finished, and they were preparing to put to sea, the additional provocation given them, by covertly traversing their project of proceeding through the Straits of Magellan, and their fears that he might at length engage a sufficient party to overturn this favourite measure, made them resolve to take advantage of the death of Cozens as a reason for depriving him of his command, under pretence of carrying him a prisoner to England to be tried for murder, and he was accordingly confined under a guard.  Yet they never meant to carry him with them, as they too well knew what they might expect on their return to England, if their commander should be present to confront them; and therefore, when just ready to depart, they set him at liberty, leaving him, and the few who chose to take their fortunes along with him, no other embarkation but the yawl, to which the barge was afterwards added, by the people on board her being prevailed upon to turn back.

When the ship was wrecked, there were about one hundred and thirty persons alive on board; above thirty of whom died on the place where they landed, and nearly eight went off in the long-boat and cutter to the southward; after whose departure, there remained no more than nineteen persons along with the captain, which were as many, however, as the barge and yawl could well carry, these being the only embarkations left them.  It was on the 13th of October, five months after the shipwreck, that the long-boat, converted into a schooner, weighed and sailed to the southwards, giving three cheers at their departure to the captain and Lieutenant Hamilton of the land-forces, and the surgeon, who were then standing on the beach.  On the 29th of January, 1742, they arrived at Rio Grande, on the coast of Brazil; but having, by various accidents, left about twenty of their people on shore at the different places where they touched, and a still greater number having perished of famine in the course of their navigation, there were not more than thirty of them remaining, when they arrived at that port.  This undertaking was certainly most extraordinary in itself; for, not to mention the great length of the voyage, the vessel was scarcely able to contain the number that first put to sea in her; and their stock of provisions, being only what they saved from the ship, diminished by five months expenditure on shore, was extremely slender.  They had also this additional misfortune, that the cutter, the only boat they had along with them, broke loose from their stern, and was staved to pieces, so that, when their provisions and water failed, they had frequently no means of getting on shore in search of a supply.