I must not dwell upon the fearful repast which immediately ensued.

Such things may be imagined, but words have no power to impress the mind with the exquisite horror of their reality.

Let it suffice to say that, having in some measure appeased the raging thirst which consumed us by the blood of the victim, and having by common consent taken off the hands, feet, and head, throwing them together with the entrails, into the sea, we devoured the rest of the body, piecemeal, during the four ever memorable days of the seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth of the month.
On the nineteenth, there coming on a smart shower which lasted fifteen or twenty minutes, we contrived to catch some water by means of a sheet which had been fished up from the cabin by our drag just after the gale.
The quantity we took in all did not amount to more than half a gallon; but even this scanty allowance supplied us with comparative strength and hope.
On the twenty-first we were again reduced to the last necessity.

The weather still remained warm and pleasant, with occasional fogs and light breezes, most usually from N.to W.
On the twenty-second, as we were sitting close huddled together, gloomily revolving over our lamentable condition, there flashed through my mind all at once an idea which inspired me with a bright gleam of hope.

I remembered that, when the foremast had been cut away, Peters, being in the windward chains, passed one of the axes into my hand, requesting me to put it, if possible, in a place of security, and that a few minutes before the last heavy sea struck the brig and filled her I had taken this axe into the forecastle and laid it in one of the larboard berths.