Travel Diaries and Journals

with fear, as well as perfectly stupid & useless. Some with the recklessness of despair, had stripped, & would have launched the only bout off the skylight, & made away with it if permitted. As the Bar [barometer] had broken itself somehow with the violent motion of the ship, the mercury having disappeared altogether, no notice can be taken of its rise. Midnight calm & stralight. October 6th at anchor off Pipley Sands. Balasore Roads sent boat ashore to get infor- mation as to the nearest telegraph, & small rice & salt for the men, all the provision in the ship being destroyed; boat returned unable to land for surf. At noon Obsd [observed] of merd altd [?] gave latde [latitude] 21.35 N making the steamer in the position above named as she was in the inshore channel only used by small vessels, thought it advisalbe not to proceed without a pilot, the boat was sent this evening & a salt sloop pilot engaged to come the followg [following] day pumping & otherwise putting the ship in order.

7th October Daylight sent boat ashore for pilot.

Balasore Roads on sending a boat ashore for provisions. The whole country was discovered to be devastated by the storm which had risen over the high sea dyke, sweeping everything before it. On steaming further up the same news was brought from Durreapoor; the people who were left, and had been without food for two days, were eased only by escaping to [Koutie?] the land was covered with the debris of the ocean, such as porpoises, sea shells, &c. mixed up with dead buffaloes & human bodies, & the stench already dreadful. The following day on arriving at Kedgeree where the "Martaban" lay dismasted. The news from the shore was the same. The Postmasters house was swept away, & himself & family with it The surveying Brig "Salween" was blown inshore off the Telegraph office which was entirely destroyed & the loss of life there was frightful. The river the whole night was emitting the putrid odour of floating carcasses, & the next morning while pro- ceeding with the "Martaban" the water all the way up was black with wreck drift bodies of men & cattle