ship to be sixty-eight days out from Swansea, bound for Valparaiso, with a cargo of smelting coal.  The fire had first been discovered on the previous Sunday, and by 6 a.m. on Monday the crew had got up their clothes and provisions on deck, thrown overboard all articles of a combustible character, such as tar, oil, paint, spare spars and sails, planks, and rope, and battened down the hatches.  Ever since then they had all been living on deck, with no protection from the wind and sea but a canvas screen.  Tom and Captain Brown proceeded on board at once.  They found the deck more than a foot deep in water, and all a-wash; when the hatches were opened for a moment dense clouds of hot suffocating yellow smoke immediately poured forth, driving back all who stood near.  From the captain’s cabin came volumes of poisonous gas, which had found its way in through the crevices, and one man, who tried to enter, was rendered insensible.

[Illustration:  Monkshaven on Fire.]

It was perfectly evident that it would be impossible to save the ship, and the captain therefore determined, after consultation with Tom and Captain Brown, to abandon her.  Some of the crew were accordingly at once brought on board the ‘Sunbeam,’ in our boat, which was then sent back to assist in removing the remainder, a portion of whom came in their own boat.  The poor fellows were almost wild with joy at getting alongside another ship, after all the hardships they had gone through, and in their excitement they threw overboard many things which they might as well have kept, as they had taken the trouble to bring them.  Our boat made three trips altogether, and by half-past six we had them all safe on board, with most of their effects, and the ship’s chronometers, charts, and papers.

The poor little dingy, belonging to the ‘Monkshaven,’ had been cast away as soon as the men had disembarked from her, and there was something melancholy in seeing her slowly drift away to leeward, followed by her oars and various small articles, as if to rejoin the noble ship she had so lately quitted.  The latter was now hove-to, under full sail, an occasional puff of smoke alone betraying the presence of the demon of destruction within.  The sky was dark and lowering, the sunset red and lurid in its grandeur, the clouds numerous and threatening, the sea high and dark, with occasional streaks of white foam.  Not a breath of wind was stirring.  Everything portended a gale.  As we lay slowly rolling from side to side, both ship and boat were sometimes plainly visible, and then again both would disappear, for what seemed an age, in the deep trough of the South Atlantic rollers.