In about six weeks from the time when the Pilgrim sailed, we had all the hides which she left us cured and stowed away; and having cleared up the ground and emptied the vats, and set everything in order, had nothing more to do, until she should come down again, but to supply ourselves with wood.  Instead of going twice a week for this purpose, we determined to give one whole week to getting wood, and then we should have enough to last us half through the summer.  Accordingly we started off every morning, after an early breakfast, with our hatchets in hand, and cut wood until the sun was over the point,—­ which was our mark for noon, as there was not a watch on the beach,—­ and then came back to dinner, and after dinner started off again with our hand-cart and ropes, and carted and ``backed’’ it down until sunset.  This we kept up for a week, until we had collected several cords,—­ enough to last us for six or eight weeks,—­ when we ``knocked off’’ altogether, much to my joy; for, though I liked straying in the woods, and cutting, very well, yet the backing the wood for so great a distance, over an uneven country, was, without exception, the hardest work I had ever done.  I usually had to kneel down, and contrive to heave the load, which was well strapped together, upon my back, and then rise up and start off with it, up the hills and down the vales, sometimes through thickets,—­ the rough points sticking into the skin and tearing the clothes, so that, at the end of the week I had hardly a whole shirt to my back.

We were now through all our work, and had nothing more to do until the Pilgrim should come down again.  We had nearly got through our provisions too, as well as our work; for our officer had been very wasteful of them, and the tea, flour, sugar, and molasses were all gone.  We suspected him of sending them up to the town; and he always treated the squaws with molasses when they came down to the beach.  Finding wheat-coffee and dry bread rather poor living, we clubbed together, and I went to the town on horseback, with a great salt-bag behind the saddle, and a few reals in my pocket, and brought back the bag full of onions, beans, pears, watermelons, and other fruits; for the young woman who tended the garden, finding that I belonged to the American ship, and that we were short of provisions, put in a larger portion.  With these we lived like fighting-cocks for a week or two, and had, besides, what the sailors call a ``blow-out on sleep,’’ not turning out in the morning until breakfast was ready.  I employed several days in overhauling my chest, and mending up all my old clothes, until I had put everything in order,—­ ``patch upon patch, like a sand-barge’s mainsail.’’ Then I took hold of Bowditch’s Navigator, which I had always with me.  I had been through the greater part of it, and now went carefully over it from beginning to end, working out most of the examples.  That done, and there being no signs of the Pilgrim, I made a descent upon old