Narrative of the surveying voyages of his majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle (vol.2): between the years 1826 and 1836 : describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagles's circumnavigation of the globe

1835. da:ngers — escape— usborne. 475 ther side of Mocha, while it was blowing hard, with a high sea running ; and in all probability, not one person would have been saved had she struck. If Mr. Usborne had not known this land well, from his late survey, it is not likely that they would have escaped, because when they found themselves about half a mile from the breakers, the tack which appeared to the others to be by far the best, was in truth the worst : had tliey gone on that tack, nothing could have saved them. Mr. Usborne saw their position exactly, and knowing how the cur- rent would aflPect them, determined upon what they thought the wrong tack, and rescued them. I say that Mr. Usborne did this ; because Mr. Biddlecombe was sick, and the master of the vessel reluctantly yielded to the person who he saw was at home, while he himself was utterly bewildered. After this narrow escape, the schooner was drifted to the south- ward, as far as the latitude of Valdivia, before the southerly wind, which took the Blonde to the mouth of the Leiibu, drove the Carmen back slowly to the northward. Mr. Usborne and his companions had almost entered the opening of the Bay of Concepcion early in the morning of the day on which the Blonde took them in tow, but had been drifted away again by a fresh wind, and were falling to leeward fast, for want of sail, when the Blonde arrived. Mr. Usborne recovered from his fatigue in two or three days, but Bennett was ill for a fort- night. During the few days they were away, they suffered much. As for the ten men belonging to the vessel, they were utterly useless, being frightened or sick during the whole time ; so that but for the exertion of the Blonde's seamen, of Bennett, of the master of the vessel (Mr. Thayer), of Mr. Biddlecombe, and above all, Mr. Usborne, the Carmen might have left her remains on the shore, when perhaps few, if any, would have survived to tell the fatal tale.* The Blonde worked to windward, with the schooner in tow, during the remainder of the day and early part of the night, and at midnight they both anchored off" Talcahuano. * Mr. Osborne's narrative of this affair is in the Appendix, No. 2/.