The culprit was confined below during the
remainder of the voyage, and when we arrived at New York presented a
pitiable sight, having been rigidly debarred by the captain's orders of
many of the commonest necessaries, I believe, the whole time. Here he
was released and discharged from the ship, glad enough to escape further
punishment, "prosecution" having been, since the occurrence, held _in
terrorem_ over him.
It was late in the afternoon of an intensely cold day, which caused the
spray to congeal as it dashed against the bulwarks and cordage of the
vessel, that we descried with great pleasure looming indistinctly in the
distance, the shores of Sandy Hook, a desolate-looking island, near the
coast of New Jersey, about seven miles south of Long Island Sound. This
the captain informed me was formerly a peninsula, but the isthmus was
broken through by the sea in 1767, the year after the declaration of
American independence, an occurrence which was at the time deemed
ominous of the severance of the colonies from the mother country, and
which proved in reality to be the precursor of that event.
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