tic; fome ran about the fhip ftamping with their feet, others wringing their hands; fome were dancing, feveral finging, fome laughing, more crying; many quite dumb, not able to fpeak a word; others fick and vomiting, feveral fwooning, and ready to faint; and a few were crofling themfelves and giving God thanks.

I would not wrong them neither; there might be many that were thankful afterward; but the paffion was too ftrong for them at first, and they were not able to mafter it; they were thrown into ecftafies and a kind of frenzy, and so there were but a very few who were compofed and serious in their joy.

Perhaps alfo the cafe may have fome addition to it, from the particular circumstance of the nation they belonged to; I mean the French, whofe temper is allowed to be more volatile, more paffionate, and more fprightly, and their spirits more fluid, than of other nations. I am not philofopher to determine the cause, but nothing I had ever seen before came up to it: the ecftafies poor Friday, my trusty savage, was in, when he found his father in the boat, came the nearest to it; and the surprise of the master, and his two companions, whom I delivered from the two villains that fet them on fhore in the island, came a little way towards it; but nothing was to compare to this, either that I saw in Friday, or any where else in my life.

It is farther obfervable, that these extravagancies did not show themselves in that different manner I have mentioned, in different perfons only: but all the variety would appear in a fhort fucceffion of moments, in one and the fame perfon. A man that we

faw

faw this minute dumb, and, as it were, ftupid and confounded, should the next minute be dancing and hallooing like an antick; and the next moment a tearing his hair, or pulling his clothes to pieces, and ftamping them under his feet like a madman; a few minutes after that, we fhould have him all in tears, then fick, then fwooning; and had not immediate help been had, would in a few moments more have been dead; and thus it was, not with one or two, or ten or twenty, but with the greatest part of them; and, if I remember right, our furgeon was obliged to let above thirty of them blood.

There were two priests among them, one an old man, and the other a young man; and that which was ftrangeft was, that the oldeft man was the worst.

As foon as he fet his foot on board our fhip, and faw himself fafe, he dropped down ftone-dead, to all appearance; not the leaft fign of life could be perceived in him; our furgeon immediately applied proper remedies to recover him; and was the only man in the fhip that believed he was not dead; and at length he opened a vein in his arm, having first chafed and rubbed the part, fo as to warm it as much as poffible: upon this the blood, which only dropped at firft, flowed fomething freely; in three minutes after the man opened his eyes; and about a quarter of an hour after that he fpoke, grew better, and, in a little time, quite well; after the blood was ftopped, he walked about, told us he was perfectly well, took a dram of cordial which the furgeon gave him, and was, what we called, come to himself; about a quarter of an hour after this, they came running

into the cabbin to the furgeon, who was bleeding a French woman that had fainted; and told him, the priest was gone stark mad. It seems he had began to revolve the change of his circumftances in his mind, and this put him into an ecftacy of joy; his fpirits whirled about faster than the veffels could convey them; the blood grew hot and feverish; and the man was as fit for Bedlam as any creature that ever was in it; the furgeon would not bleed him again in that condition, but gave him fomething to doze and put him to fleep, which, after fome time, operated upon him, and he waked next morning perfectly compofed, and well.

The younger priest behaved himself with great command of his paffion, and was really an example of a ferious well-governed mind; at his first coming on board the fhip, he threw himself flat on his face, proftrating himself in thankfulness for his deliverance; in which I unhappily and unfeasonably disturbed him, really thinking he had been in a swoon; but he spoke calmly; thanked me; told me, he was giving God thanks for his deliverance; begged me to leave him a few moments, and that, next to his Maker, he would give me thanks alfo.

I was heartily forry that I disturbed him; and not only left him, but kept others from interrupting him alfo; he continued in that posture about three minutes, or a little more, after I left him; then came to me, as he had said he would, and, with a great deal of seriousness and affection, but with tears in his eyes, thanked me, that had, under God, given him and fo many miferable creatures their lives: I told him, I had no room to move him to thank God

God for it, rather than me; for I had feen, that he had done that already: but I added, that it was nothing but what reafon and humanity dictated to all men, and that we had as much reafon as he to give thanks to God, who had blessed us fo far as to make us the inftruments of his mercy to fo many of his creatures.

After this the young priest applied himfelf to his country folks; laboured to compose them; perfuaded intreated, argued, reafoned with them, and did his utmoft to keep them within the exercife of their reafon; and with fome he had fuccefs, though others were, for a time, out of all government of themselves.

I cannot help committing this to writing, as perhaps it may be useful to thofe into whofe hands it may fall, in the guiding themfelves in all the extravagancies of their paffions; for if an excefs of joy can carry men out to fuch a length beyond the reach of their reason, what will not the extravagancies of anger, rage, and a provoked mind, carry us to? And indeed, here I faw reason for keeping an exceeding watch over our paffions of every kind, as well thofe of joy and fatisfaction, as thofe of forrow and anger.

We were fomething difordered by thefe extravagancies among our new guests for the first day; but when they had been retired, lodgings provided for them as well as our fhip would allow, and they had flept heartily, as most of them did, being fatigued and frightened, they were quite another fort of people the next day.

Nothing of good manners, or civil acknowledgments for the kindness fhewn them was wanting; the French, it is known, are naturally apt enough to exceed that way. The captain, and one of the priests, came to me the next day; and, defiring to fpeak with me and my nephew, the commander, began to confult with us what fhould be done with them; and firft they told us, that, as we had faved their lives, fo all they had was little enough for a return to us for the kindness received. The captain faid, they had faved fome money, and fome things of value in their boats, catched haftily out of the flames; and if we would accept it, they were ordered to make an offer of it all to us; they only defired to be fet on fhore fomewhere in our way, where, if poffible, they might get a paffage to France.

My nephew was for accepting their money at first word, and to confider what to do with them afterwards; but I over-ruled him in that part; for I knew what it was to be fet on fhore in a strange country; and if the Portugal captain that took me up at fea had served me fo, and took all I had for my deliverance, I must have starved, or have been as much a flave at the Brafils, as I had been at Barbary, the being fold to a Mahometan only excepted; and perhaps a Portuguese is not a much better master than a Turk, if not, in fome cafes, a much worse.

I therefore told the French captain, that we had taken them up in their distress, it was true; but that it was our duty to do fo, as we were fellow-creatures, and as we would defire to be fo delivered, if we were in the like or any other extremity; that we had done nothing for them, but what we believed they would