Village books

It
is a long time ago--thirty-two years--and it doesn't matter now, yet one
is sorry for their disappointment. 'Thought often of those at home
to-day, and of the disappointment they will feel next Sunday at not
hearing from us by telegraph from San Francisco.' It will be many weeks
yet before the telegram is received, and it will come as a thunderclap of
joy then, and with the seeming of a miracle, for it will raise from the
grave men mourned as dead. 'To-day our rations were reduced to a quarter
of a biscuit a meal, with about half a pint of water.' This is on May
13, with more than a month of voyaging in front of them yet! However, as
they do not know that, 'we are all feeling pretty cheerful.'
In the afternoon of the 14th there was a thunderstorm, 'which toward
night seemed to close in around us on every side, making it very dark and
squally.' 'Our situation is becoming more and more desperate,' for they
were making very little northing 'and every day diminishes our small
stock of provisions.


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