its height, his mind reverted with great satisfaction to this, as he termed them, 'happy pair.'" I have extended the extract beyond the passage immediately relating to the conduct of the captain, in order to show, in the character and feelings of the excellent individuals referred to, how "distressing" indeed it must have proved to the many similarly disposed persons who were on board. Several ladies, it seems, remained in the gentleman's cabin after dinner; but their presence appears to have imposed no restraint upon the captain: the Misses Owen, for instance, of whom Mr. Tinne, without knowing them, speaks as follows;—" The captain talked a great deal after the meal. He was complimenting two young ladies upon their good seamanship, and I was so struck with the sweet tones of their voices, and their pure diction, as well as the sensible nature of their remarks, that I made an effort to see them, notwithstanding the augmentation of sickness by the slightest movement. They were both interesting looking persons, had on black silk dresses, and I think straw bonnets." Of course, these young ladies, whose "sweet` tones," alas! were so soon to become mute in death,—these accomplished young ladies, in common with Mrs. Forster, and others of the same high order of christian piety and intellectual refinement, were subjected to the same gross annoyances of which Mr. Forster had so justly complained; but the captain was then, it may be supposed, only in the first stage of excess.

The mate also, William Vavasour, appears by the statements of the survivors to have been even more incapacitated by intoxication than his superior; so that, as two of the crew out of four (her usual complement) had been left at Bangor on the preceding voyage, there must have been a miserable lack of efficiency in working the vessel. The passengers were not, probably, aware of this at the time, to its full extent; but still, those who were upon deck, felt

increasing uneasiness at the inattention of the captain, and Mr. Tarrey was at length deputed to go down to him, for the purpose of endeavouring to impress upon him the propriety of no longer persevering in what appeared to them so hazardous an attempt, but to return to Liverpool while the power remained so to do. He at once refused, however, to accede to such a proposition; and surlily remarked, "If we were to turn back with passengers it would never do; we should have no profit." They accordingly proceeded, but the vessel still made little way, in consequence of the utter inadequacy of the propelling power afforded by her single engine to breast so heavy

a sea.

While off the Floating Light, the western bank of the Hoyle Sands being at the time close under his lee, the Prince Llewellyn steamer (Captain Wright) passed to windward, on her voyage from Beaumaris to Liverpool; and so far was the Rothsay Castle then to leeward of her course, that it occasioned much surprise on board the Llewellyn, several of her passengers and crew expressing an opinion that "something was the matter;" for, with an adverse wind and tide, a heavy sea, and a lee shore, it was the duty of the captain to keep much farther from the land, even than the Llewellyn, in order to attain a more commanding situation for weathering* the Great Ormshead. He would then have been enabled to steer about W. S. W. for the Menai Strait (see the chart), which would have

* To weather an object is to pass to windward of it; and, under the above circumstances, it was desirable to give the formidable promontory in question as "wide a berth," as a sailor would term it, as possible: that is to say, it should have been kept at as great a distance as the intended destination of the vessel would allow, especially as in the present case great advantage, in addition to immediate safety, would have resulted from such a proceeding.

brought the wind fairly upon his beam,* and then the sails would have come into effective operation, in aid of the flagging steam, and in counteraction to the tide, which set upon his weather bow† from about W. N. W., checking and turning the vessel's head from her course. But the captain was at dinner, and whatever was "the matter," unfortunately, as no intimation of it was given, the vessels severally held on their way, without communicating with each other—the one to land her passengers in safety, ride in the quiet of a sheltered port; the other to bear her victims to the sacrifice, and furnish at once the altar of immolation and a grave.

and

When the Captain revisited the deck, at a little after five o'clock, a number of the passengers renewed their importunities, and entreated him to put back, declaring that all on board would most willingly relinquish their claim to the fare, some even offering the inducement of further pecuniary reward; but he evinced much irritation in consequence, and some of his observations were certainly characterised by the grossest brutality. To one gentleman he tauntingly said, 66 What, I suppose you have committed murder, that you are so frightened!" and he generally boasted that " he was

* That is, it would have blown full upon the vessel's side, directly crossing her course.

The meaning both of windward and leeward has already been explained; but it may be necessary to add, that weather is applied to any thing to windward, and lee to that which is to leeward. Thus the weather bow is that side of the head of a vessel directly or obliquely opposed to the wind. For instance, if a vessel's head be to the westward, and the wind northerly, such wind would be said to be on the starboard (or right) side, which then would also be termed the weather side; and the larboard (or left) side, under such circumstances, would be called the lee side. By the same rule, the land off the lee side would be designated a lee shore.

not one that turned back," and that “if they knew him they would not make such a request," &c. This insulting disregard to the wishes of the passengers (for with courage it had nothing to do) was maintained with sottish stubbornness, under circumstances which rendered it truly amazing that no spirit of resistance was excited in the company present. The water had, during most of the day, been forcing its way through the axles of the paddles; and the shattered vessel had everywhere

"Sucked through loosened planks the rushing sea,"

until the cabin floors were inundated, and the fires belonging to the engine were partially extinguished; which latter misfortune increased, until it produced the final catastrophe. In addition to all this, a lee shore was hugged* with maniacal indifference, no timely effort having been made to escape from it, no due sense of its danger having been evinced; and, in short, such was the state of extraordinary quiescence which prevailed, that investigation is baffled at every turn in pursuit of a natural cause: for, that so many intelligent persons should suffer themselves, either in these or subsequent instances, to be overawed by the vulgar blustering of such a man, cannot be accounted for by any thing short of fatality itself. What was he, virtually, but the servant of those on board? Nearly one hundred and fifty persons had conjointly, as it were, hired both vessel

and crew; and if, in the prosecution of their intended voyage, a very large majority of so great a number,- more than nine tenths, I may confidently state,―were of opinion that their lives were endangered, and that it was advisable to adopt immediate means for preservation; if this were the case, even admitting that the seamanship (save the mark!) of Captain Atkinson would have excited his scorn and con

* A vessel is said to hug the shore when she is kept close to it.

tempt for such pusillanimous conduct, it was his duty to have conceded so much to the strenuous wishes,- —or fears, if he liked the term better,-of his passengers. They might then have been saved, though that safety might have incurred the captain's ridicule; but that would have rested far, far lighter upon the living, than the earth or the waters now lie upon the lamented dead! He should have been placed under restraint, together with his mate, if necessary: a promise of remuneration would easily have procured compliance on the part of the rest of the scanty crew. Had such measures been adopted, at the period of which I now speak, there would have been, so far as human foresight extends, no probability of the "Wreck of the Rothsay Castle.”

Between six and seven o'clock the ebb tide made, and hopes were entertained that this circumstance would contribute greatly to assist their progress: but, as Mr. Scoresby judiciously observes, in the work before quoted, "whilst it helped them on the one hand by its north-westerly influence, it rendered their progress more critical on the other, by the disturbance excited through its windward action on the previously turbulent sea." The effect of this was soon observable. The vessel laboured on with increasing difficulty, at a rate averaging little more than two miles an hour, the engine becoming more powerless in proportion to the waning of the fires, consequent upon the additional quantity of water admitted by the opening seams and the continued breaking of heavy seas upon the deck. The captain was, for the most part, below; and his replies to the many anxious inquiries as to the progress they were making, and the probable time at which they might expect to arrive at Beaumaris, were either triflingly evasive or contradictory in the extreme. On one occasion, while on deck, he acknowledged that "it was the heaviest sea he had ever witnessed in those parts;" but, with the uncer