As the days sped by and the promised reinforcements did not arrive, their eyes turned longingly to France, and the desire to escape from their dreary exile grew upon them.

   There was not a man of the party who was familiar with the building of a ship, but desperation lent them daring, and with the aid of the forge left them by Ribault they began the construction of a small vessel of about twenty tons.

   They caulked the seams with grey moss gathered from the forest trees and with pitch collected from incisions made in the pines. Sails were manufactured from shirts and bed coverings. The Indians, glad to be rid of them, furnished them with ropes and cordage twisted from the bark of trees.

   They next loaded the boat with the guns which had been left for their defense, the forge, and what ammunition remained to them, stored it to the best of their ability with provisions obtained from the Indians, and in their eagerness to depart, set sail for France without thought of the fickleness of the winds, the meagerness of their supplies, or the fact that there was not a member of their party who understood the art of navigation.

   They had barely travelled one-third of the distance which separated them from their homes, when they were overtaken by calms so prolonged that in three weeks they made but twenty-five leagues.

   In the meantime their provisions began to fail them, and their rations were cut down to twelve grains of corn a day. Finally even this slender sustenance was exhausted and death by starvation and thirst stared them in the face. The miserable Frenchmen were now reduced to eating their leather shoes and jerkins, and to slaking their parched throats with the waters of the surrounding sea and their own urine.

   In this extremity their frail vessel began to leak at every seam, and in their enfeebled condition they were compelled to keep bailing it continually to escape being devoured by the sea. Then a contrary wind arose and threatened to swamp them.

   Some of their number died of hunger, and at last, having gone for three days without food or drink, but one supreme expedient remained, and the unfortunate Lachtre, who had barely escaped with his life from starving to death on the island near Charlesfort, was sacrificed to furnish food for his perishing companions.'

   At last land was discovered, and, driven crazy by the sight, they allowed their boat to drift hither and thither upon the sea without an effort to reach it.

   In this pitiable condition they were spied by an English vessel on board of which was one of their own countrymen, who, in a preceding voyage, had himself visited New France, and through his instrumentality the survivors were rescued.