THE NAUTILUS.

ONLY a few weeks after the loss of the Athenienne, and of so many of her crew, a shipwreck occurred in another part of the Mediterranean, attended by circumstances of most painful interest.

His Majesty's sloop, Nautilus, commanded by Captain Palmer, left the squadron of Sir Thomas Louis in the Hellespont, on the morning of the: 3rd of January, 1807, bearing dispatches of the utmost importance for England.

The wind blowing fresh from the north-east, the sloop continued her course through the Archipelago without danger or mischance, until the evening of the 4th, when she was off Anti Milo; the pilot then gave up his charge, professing himself ignorant of the coast they were now approaching. As the dispatches confided to Captain Palmer were of great moment, he determined to run every hazard rather than retard their delivery. He therefore sailed from Anti Milo at sunset, and shaped his course to Cerigotto. At midnight, the wind had risen to a gale; the night was dark and gloomy; torrents of rain were falling, accompanied by loud and incessant peals of thunder, whilst vivid flashes of lightning ever and anon illuminated for an instant the murky sky, and left all in obscurity more dismal than before.

At two o'clock A.M., the tempest and the darkness having increased, the captain gave orders to close-reef topsails, and prepare for bringing-to until daybreak. A little after three o'clock, a bright flash of lightning discovered to them, the Island of Cerigotto right ahead, and about a mile distant. The captain considered his course to be now clear, and therefore directed all possible sail to be kept on the vessel without endangering the masts, at the same time he congratulated Lieutenant Nesbitt upon their escape from the threatened dangers of the Archipelago.

He then went below, and was engaged with the pilot in examining the chart, when a cry was heard of 'Breakers ahead!' Lieutenant Nesbitt, who was on deck, ordered the helm a-lee; it was scarcely done, when the vessel struck. The shock was so violent, that the men below were thrown out of their hammocks, and they had difficulty in getting upon deck, for every sea lifted up the ship and then again dashed her upon the rocks with such force that they could not keep their feet. All was confusion and alarm. Every one felt his own utter helplessness.

'Oh! my Lord,' writes Lieutenant Nesbitt to Lord Collingwood, 'it draws tears from my eyes when I reflect on the complicated miseries of the scene! Heaven, now our only resource, was piteously invoked; and happy am I to say, our gallant crew left nothing untried which we imagined could save us—all cheerfully obeying the orders of the officers. An instant had hardly elapsed ere our main-deck was burst in, and a few minutes after the lee bulwark was entirely overwhelmed. A heavy sea broke entirely over us, and none could see the smallest aperture through which hope might enter, and enliven the chill and dreary prospect before us.'

The only chance of escape for the crew was by the boats, and one only, a small whale-boat, got clear of the ship in safety, the others were all either stove or washed off the booms and dashed to pieces on the rocks by the raging surf. The boat that escaped was manned by the coxswain, George Smith, and nine others. When they got clear of the wreck, they lay on their oars, and those who had clothing shared it with others who were nearly naked. They then pulled towards the Island of Pauri, seeing that it was impossible for them to render any assistance to their wretched comrades, as the boat already carried as many as she could possibly stow.

After the departure of the whale-boat, the ship continued to strike every two or three minutes, but as she was thrown higher on the rock, the men perceived that a part of it was above water; and as they expected the vessel to go to pieces at every shock, that lonely rock offered a safer refuge from the waves than the frail timbers to which they were clinging. The mercy of Providence soon provided them with the means of exchanging their perilous situation for one of less certain and instant danger. The mainmast fell over the side about twenty minutes after the vessel struck, and the mizen and foremasts followed. These all served as gangways by which the people passed through the surf from the wreck to the platform of the coral reef, and thus for the time were rescued from the certain death that awaited them if they remained on board.

The rock, which they reached with difficulty, was scarcely above water; it was between three and four hundred yards long, and two hundred wide; and upon this spot, in the midst of the deep, nearly a hundred men were thrown together, without food, almost without clothing, and with very little hope that they should ever escape from the perils that surrounded them. They had only left the wreck in time to hear her dashed to pieces against the rocks; her timbers quivering, rending, and groaning, as they were riven asunder by the remorseless waves. When day dawned upon the cheerless group, its light only revealed new horrors: the sea on all sides was strewed with fragments of the wreck; not a sail was visible on the waters, and many of their comrades were seen clinging to spars and planks, tossed hither and thither by the waves. The situation of the survivors was truly distressing; they were at least twelve miles from the nearest island, and their only chance of relief was in the possibility of a ship passing near enough to see the signal which they hoisted on a long pole fixed to the rocks.

The day was bitterly cold, and with much difficulty the unfortunate men contrived to kindle a fire, by means of a knife and flint that were happily in the pocket of one of the sailors, and a small barrel of damp powder that had been washed on to the rock. They next constructed a tent with pieces of canvas, boards, and parts of the wreck, and so they were enabled to dry the few clothes they had upon them. And now they had to pass a long and dreary night, exposed to hunger, cold, and wet; but they kept the fire burning, hoping that it might be visible in the darkness, and be taken for a signal of distress. And so it proved; for the coxswain and crew of the whale boat, who were on the Island of Pauri, observed the fire in the middle of the night, and the next morning the coxswain and pilot, with four of the men, pulled to the rocks, in hopes that some of their comrades might be still living.

They were beyond measure astonished to find so many survivors from the wreck, when they had scarcely dared to hope that any could have been saved except themselves. They had no food or water in their boat; for they had found nothing on the Island of Pauri (which was only a mile in circumference) but a few sheep and goats, kept there by the inhabitants of Cerigo, and a little rain-water that was preserved in a hole of the rock. The coxswain attempted to persuade Captain Palmer to come into the boat, but the intrepid officer refused. 'Never mind me,' was his noble reply; 'save your unfortunate shipmates.'

After some consultation, the Captain ordered the coxswain to take ten of the people from the rock and make the best of his way to Cerigotto, and return as soon as possible with assistance.

Soon after the departure of the boat, the wind increased to a gale, the waves dashed over the rock and extinguished the fire, and some of the men were compelled to cling to the highest part of the rock, and others to hold on by a rope fastened round a projecting point, in order to save themselves from being washed away by the surf; and thus a second night was passed, even more wretched than the first. Many of the people became delirious from the fatigue, hunger, thirst, and cold, which they had suffered, and several died during the night; some, apparently, from the effect of the intense cold upon their exhausted frames. Terrible was the scene which daylight presented: indiscriminately crowded together on a small spot, were the living, the dying, and the dead; and the wretched survivors unable to give any help to those whose sufferings might shortly be their own.

There was nothing to be done, but to wait in hope for the return of the whale-boat, when, to the indescribable joy of all, a ship, with all sail set, hove in sight: she was coming down before the wind, and steering directly for the rock.

This cheering sight infused vigour into the weakest and most desponding. Signals of distress were instantly made, and at last they were perceived by the vessel, which brought to, and then hoisted out her boat. Great was the joy of all the famishing creatures on the rock, to see their deliverance at hand; the strongest began to fasten spars and planks together to form rafts, on which they might get to the ship; the boat came within pistol-shot. She was full of men, who rested on their oars for a few minutes, as if to examine the persons whom they were approaching: the man at the helm waved his hat, and then the boat's head was put round and they pulled back again to the ship, and left the crew of the Nautilus to their fate.

The transition from hope to despair was terrible,—all that day they watched in vain for the return of their own boat from Cerigotto; but hour after hour passed away, and they began, at length, to fear that she had been lost in the gale of the preceding night.

Death, in its most horrible forms, now stared them in the face; the pangs of hunger and thirst were almost insupportable. There was—

Some, indeed, of the poor sufferers were desperate enough to allay their raging thirst with salt water, in spite of the entreaties and warnings of those who knew how terrible are its effects. In a few hours those who had drunk it were seized with violent hysteria and raving madness, which in many ended in death.

Another night drew on, and they made their sad preparations for it by huddling together as closely as they could, to keep alive the little warmth that remained in their bodies, and covering themselves with the few ragged garments that were left. Happily the weather was more moderate, and they hoped to be able to get through the night; but worn out as they were, the ravings of some of their companions banished sleep from the eyes of the rest. In the middle of the night they were unexpectedly hailed by the crew of the whale-boat.

The first cry from the rock was—'water! water!' but water they had none. They had found it impossible to procure anything but earthen vessels, and these could not be carried through the surf. The coxswain, however, informed them that next morning a large vessel would come to their relief; and in this hope of a speedy deliverance they were encouraged to further endurance. The morning broke at last, but no boat appeared; then came a reaction, and the heart-sickness of hope deferred. The scenes that occurred on that day were too dreadful to relate—it was the fourth on which they had not tasted food.

They must now either taste human flesh or perish—there was no alternative.

A young man who had died the previous night was selected to be food for the rest.[9] Most of them had not power to masticate or to swallow—

Before evening death had made fearful ravages, and had numbered amongst its victims Captain Palmer and the first lieutenant.

Another night came on; long and anxiously had they gazed upon the horizon—in vain had they strained their blood-shot eyes to see some vessel coming to their relief. The shades of night closed round them, and sadly they awaited the dawn of another day, resolving that if they lived to see it they would construct a raft and commit themselves to the waves, rather than remain to die of hunger and thirst. Accordingly, at daylight they began to put their plan into execution by fastening some of the larger spars together, and in a few hours the raft was completed. The eventful moment for launching it arrived, when with bitter grief and disappointment they beheld the work of their hands, which it had cost them so much labour to achieve, dashed to pieces in a few seconds and scattered adrift upon the waves. Some of the men, rendered desperate by seeing their last chance of escape thus snatched from them, rushed into the sea, grasping at such parts of the wreck as came within their reach; but they were all swept away by the current, and their unhappy comrades saw them no more.

In the afternoon, the coxswain arrived in the whale-boat, but he came without bringing them any food or means of escape—for all his entreaties had been unavailing to persuade the Greek fishermen to put to sea whilst the gale continued. They had, however, promised to come to the relief of the sufferers the next day if the weather should be more favourable.

This was the fifth day that these wretched men had passed without food of any kind except the disgusting morsel they had attempted to swallow. Many who were completely exhausted, stretched their weary limbs on the hard rocks and expired, and before night the greater part of the survivors were in a state of complete insensibility.

On the sixth morning they were scarcely able to raise themselves from the rock to look once more upon the sea, when one less feeble than the rest exclaimed, 'the boats are coming.' And most welcome was the sight of four fishing vessels, and the whale-boat steering towards them. Such joy was theirs as can only be understood by those who have experienced a similar deliverance from the jaws of death. The boats reached the rocks; they contained a supply of water and food, which were distributed in moderation among the perishing seamen, who, when they were a little renovated, were taken on board the boats, and in a few hours landed on Cerigotto.

The poor but hospitable inhabitants of the island received the strangers most kindly, and tended them with the utmost care. Out of one hundred and twenty-two, sixty-four only survived. And when we think of the complicated miseries they had so long endured, we may wonder that so many were spared.

After remaining eleven days at Cerigotto, the remnant of the crew of the Nautilus went to Cerigo, and from thence they sailed to Malta.

Lieutenant Nesbitt and the survivors were tried by a court-martial at Cadiz for the loss of the Nautilus.

The court gave it as their opinion, 'That the loss of that sloop was occasioned by the captain's zeal to forward the public dispatches, which induced him to run in a dark, tempestuous night for the passage between the Island of Cerigotto and Candia; but that the sloop passed between Cerigotto and Pauri, and was lost on a rock, on the south-west part of that passage, which rock does not appear to be laid down in Heather's Chart, by which the said sloop was navigated.

'That no blame attaches to the conduct of Lieutenant Nesbitt, or such of the surviving crew of the Nautilus, but that it appears that Lieutenant Nesbitt and the officers and crew did use every exertion that circumstances could admit.'

Lieutenant Nesbitt died in 1824.

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