;
I I
that the most interesting part of her voyage—the carrying a
chain of meridian distances around the globe—must eventually
be sacrificed to the tedious, although not less useful, details of
coast surveying.
Our working ground lay so far from ports at which supplies
could be obtained, that we were obliged to occupy whole
months in making passages merely to get provisions, and then
overload our little vessel to a most inconvenient degree, as may
he supposed, when I say that eight months’ provisions was our
usual stock at starting, and that we sailed twice with ten
months’ supply on board.*
I had often anxiously longed for a consort, adapted for car-
rying cargoes, rigged so as to be easily worked with few hands,
and able to keep company with the Beagle; but when I saw
the Unicorn, and heard how well she had behaved as a sea-
boat, my wish to purchase her was unconquerable. A fitter
vessel I could hardly have met with, one hundred and seventy
tons burthen, oak built, and copper fastened throughout, very
roomy, a good sailer, extremely handy, and a first-rate sea-
boat ; her only deficiencies were such as I could supply,
namely, a few sheets of copper, and an outfit of canvas and
rope. A few days elapsed, in which she was surveyed very
carefully by Mr. May, and my mind fully made up, before I
decided to buy her, and I then agreed to give six thousand
dollars (nearly £1,300) for immediate possession. Being part
owner, and authorized by the other owners to do as he thought
best with the vessel in case of failure, Mr. Low sold her to me,
payment to be made into his partners’ hands at Monte Video.
Some of his crew being ‘ upon the lay,’ that is, having agreed
to be paid for their work by a small proportion of the cargo
obtained, preferred remaining at the Falklands to seek for
employment in other vessels, others procured a passage in the
Rapid, and a few were engaged by me to serve in their own
vessel which, to keep up old associations, I named ‘ Adventure.’
Mr. Chaffers and others immediately volunteered to go
* Excepting water, of which we only carried six weeks.
in her temporarily (for I intended to place Mr. Wickham in
her if he should be willing to undertake the responsibility),
and no time was lost in cleaning her out thoroughly, loading
her with stores purchased by me from M. le Dilly and from
Mr. Bray (lately master of the Transport), and despatching
her to Maldonado, to be prepared for her future employment.
This schooner was built at Rochester as a yacht for Mr.
Perkins, and, as I have reason to believe, cost at least six
thousand pounds in building and first outfit. Soon afterwards,
she was armed and used by Lord Cochrane in the Mediterranean
; then she was fitted out by a merchant to break the
blockade of Buenos Ayres ; but, taken by a Brazilian man-of-
war, and carried into Monte Video, she was condemned as a
prize and sold to Mr. Hood, the British Consul, who went to
Fngland and back again in her with his family ; after which,
she was fitted out for the sealing expedition I have mentioned.
At the time of my purchase she was in want of a thorough
refit, and her internal arrangements required alteration ; but it
happened that Mr. Bray and M. le Dilly had each saved enough
from their respective vessels to enable me to load the Adventure
on the spot with all that she would require; from the
former I bought anchors, cables, and other stores, amounting
to rif?216: and from M. le Dilly rope, canvas, and small spars,
for which ¿&187 were paid. Those who were conversant in
such matters, the master, boatswain, and carpenter of the
Beagle, as well as others, assured me that these articles were
thus obtained for less than a third of their market prices in
frequented ports.
While the Beagle lay in Johnson Cove, we witnessed a
memorable instance of the strength with which squalls sometimes
sweep across the Falklands. Our ship was moored with
a cable each way in a land-locked cove, not a mile across, and
to the south-westward of her, three cables’ length distant, was
a point of land which, under ordinary circumstances, would
have protected her from sea, if not from wind. Our largest
boat, the yawl, was moored near our eastern anchor, with a
long scope of small chain. At six in the evening of a stormy
T 2