and awe on the huge waves as they rolled past, occasionally immersing our little vessel in their white crests—­and listening, with emotions not wholly devoid of fear, to the wild screams of the seabirds as they skimmed o’er the steep acclivities of these moving masses.  The landsmen were evidently deeply impressed with the grandeur of a storm at sea; nor can the hardiest seaman look with unconcern on such an exhibition of the majesty of Him, whose will the winds and waves obey.  Not more poetically beautiful than literally true are the words of the Psalmist, so appropriately introduced into the Form of Prayers at Sea—­“They that go down to the sea in ships, and occupy their business in great waters:  these men see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep:  for at his word the stormy wind ariseth, which lifteth up the waves thereof.”  My own experience has over and over again satisfied me, that, mingled with many a dim superstition, a deep religious sentiment—­a conviction of the might and mercy of Heaven—­often rests on the heart of the most reckless seaman, himself all unconscious of its existence, yet strangely influenced by its operations!

Anchor at Simon’s bay.

We sighted land on the evening of the 20th of September, rounded the Cape the next morning, and in the afternoon anchored in Simon’s Bay.  We found here H.M.S.  Thalia, bearing the flag of Admiral Sir Patrick Campbell, Commander-in-chief of the Cape station:  and during our subsequent stay received every attention which kindness and courtesy could suggest, from himself and his officers.

We were glad to ascertain that our chronometers had been performing admirably.  They gave the longitude of Simon’s Bay, within a few seconds of our homeward determination during the last voyage.  Mr. Maclear, of the Royal Observatory, and Captain Wauchope, of the flagship, had been measuring the difference of longitude between Simon’s Bay dockyard and Cape Town Observatory, by flashing lights upon the summit of a mountain midway between those two places.  Their trials gave a greater difference, by a half second, between the two meridians, than we had obtained on a former visit by carrying chronometers to and fro.  The results stand as follow: 

Mr. Maclear and Captain Wauchope:  11.5 seconds South.

H.M.  Sloop Beagle:  11.0 seconds South.

Adventures of Captain Harris.

We found at the Cape the renowned Captain Harris, H.E.I.  Company’s Bombay Engineers, who had just returned from his sporting expedition into the interior of Southern Africa, having made his way through every obstacle, from the frontier of the Cape Colony, through the territories of the chief Moselekatse, to the Tropic of Capricorn.  With his spirit-stirring accounts of hunting adventure and savage manners we were all most highly gratified.  What he had seen, where he had been, and what he had performed “by