I remember one day being sent with a note for the commanding officer of the flag-ship, which Sir Samuel Hood was very desirous should be sent on board; but as the weather was too tempestuous to allow even a masullah boat to pass the surf, I was obliged to give it to a catamaran man.

The poor fellow drew off his head a small skull-cap, made apparently of some kind of skin, or oil-cloth, or bladder, and having deposited his despatches therein, proceeded to execute his task.
We really thought, at first, that our messenger must have been drowned even in crossing the inner bar, for we well-nigh lost sight of him in the hissing yeast of waves in which he and his catamaran appeared only at intervals, tossing about like a cork.

But by far the most difficult part of his task remained after he had reached the comparatively smooth space between the two lines of surf, where we could observe him paddling to and fro as if in search of an opening in the moving wall of water raging between him and the roadstead.

He was watching for a favourable moment, when, after the dash of some high wave, he might hope to make good his transit in safety.
After allowing a great many seas to break before he attempted to cross the outer bar, he at length seized the proper moment, and turning his little bark to seaward, paddled out as fast as he could.

Just as the gallant fellow, however, reached the shallowest part of the bar, and we fancied him safely across, a huge wave, which had risen with unusual quickness, elevated its foaming crest right before him, curling upwards many feet higher than his shoulders.