the Anna pink.  This ship, though, like the Gloucester, she had fallen in to the northward of the island, had yet the good fortune to come to an anchor in the bay at five in the afternoon.  Her arrival gave us all the sincerest joy, for each ship’s company was now restored to its full allowance of bread, and we were now freed from the apprehensions of our provisions falling short before we could reach some amicable port—­a calamity which, in these seas, is of all others the most irretrievable.  This was the last ship that joined us.

(Note.  The flour was on board the Anna pink.)

CHAPTER 12.  THE WRECK OF THE WAGER—­A MUTINY.

The remaining ships of the squadron were the Severn, the Pearl, and the Wager, store-ship.  The Severn and Pearl parted company with the squadron off Cape Noir and, as we afterwards learned, put back to the Brazils, so that of all the ships which came into the South Seas the Wager, Captain Cheap, was the only one that was missing.  This ship had on board some field-pieces mounted for land service, together with some Cohorn mortars, and several kinds of artillery, stores, and tools, intended for the operations on shore; and therefore, as the enterprise on Baldivia had been resolved on for the first undertaking of the squadron, Captain Cheap was extremely solicitous that these materials, which were in his custody, might be ready before Baldivia, that if the squadron should possibly rendezvous there, no delay nor disappointment might be imputed to him.

But whilst the Wager, with these views, was making the best of her way to her first rendezvous off the island of Socoro, she made the land on the 14th of May, about the latitude of 47 degrees south, and the captain, exerting himself on this occasion in order to get clear of it, he had the misfortune to fall down the after-ladder, and thereby dislocated his shoulder, which rendered him incapable of acting.  This accident, together with the crazy condition of the ship, which was little better than a wreck, prevented her from getting off to sea, and entangled her more and more with the land, so that the next morning at daybreak she struck on a sunken rock, and soon after bilged and grounded between two small islands at about a musket-shot from the shore.

DISORDER AND ANARCHY.

In this situation the ship continued entire a long time, so that all the crew had it in their power to get safe on shore, but a general confusion taking place, numbers of them, instead of consulting their safety or reflecting on their calamitous condition, fell to pillaging the ship, arming themselves with the first weapons that came to hand and threatening to murder all who should oppose them.  This frenzy was greatly heightened by the liquors they found on board, with which they got so extremely drunk that some of them, tumbling down between decks, were drowned as the water flowed in, being incapable of getting