come upon deck immediately.  He said it was very well, and I went up again.  As soon as I was upon deck the wind, which had been pretty high, having abated a little, the vessel began to be carried sideways towards the rock, by means of the current.  Still the captain did not appear.  I therefore went to him again, and told him the vessel was then near a large rock, and desired he would come up with speed.  He said he would, and I returned to the deck.  When I was upon the deck again I saw we were not above a pistol shot from the rock, and I heard the noise of the breakers all around us.  I was exceedingly alarmed at this; and the captain having not yet come on the deck I lost all patience; and, growing quite enraged, I ran down to him again, and asked him why he did not come up, and what he could mean by all this?  ‘The breakers,’ said I, ‘are round us, and the vessel is almost on the rock.’  With that he came on the deck with me, and we tried to put the vessel about, and get her out of the current, but all to no purpose, the wind being very small.  We then called all hands up immediately; and after a little we got up one end of a cable, and fastened it to the anchor.  By this time the surf was foaming round us, and made a dreadful noise on the breakers, and the very moment we let the anchor go the vessel struck against the rocks.  One swell now succeeded another, as it were one wave calling on its fellow:  the roaring of the billows increased, and, with one single heave of the swells, the sloop was pierced and transfixed among the rocks!  In a moment a scene of horror presented itself to my mind, such as I never had conceived or experienced before.  All my sins stared me in the face; and especially, I thought that God had hurled his direful vengeance on my guilty head for cursing the vessel on which my life depended.  My spirits at this forsook me, and I expected every moment to go to the bottom:  I determined if I should still be saved that I would never swear again.  And in the midst of my distress, while the dreadful surfs were dashing with unremitting fury among the rocks, I remembered the Lord, though fearful that I was undeserving of forgiveness, and I thought that as he had often delivered he might yet deliver; and, calling to mind the many mercies he had shewn me in times past, they gave me some small hope that he might still help me.  I then began to think how we might be saved; and I believe no mind was ever like mine so replete with inventions and confused with schemes, though how to escape death I knew not.  The captain immediately ordered the hatches to be nailed down on the slaves in the hold, where there were above twenty, all of whom must unavoidably have perished if he had been obeyed.  When he desired the man to nail down the hatches I thought that my sin was the cause of this, and that God would charge me with these people’s blood.  This thought rushed upon my mind that instant with such violence, that it quite overpowered me, and I fainted.