Raphael Semmes, Memoirs of Service Afloat During the War Between the States

[630] day. It will take these prisoners a certain number of days to reach a given port. It will take a certain other number of days, for the news of the capture to travel thence to Washington. And it will take a certain other number still, for a ship of war of the enemy to reach the coast of Brazil. Just before this aggregate of days elapses, I haul aft my trysail sheets, and stretch over to the Cape of Good Hope. I find no enemy's ship of war awaiting me here. I go to work on the stream of commerce doubling the Cape. And by the time, I think, that the ships which have arrived on the coast of Brazil in pursuit of me, have heard of my being at the Cape, and started in fresh chase; I quietly stretch back to the coast of Brazil, and go to work as before. Voila tout! The reader will have occasion to remark, by the time we get through with our cruises, how well this system worked for me; as he will have observed, that I did not fall in with a single enemy's cruiser at sea, at any time during my whole career!

We had, some days since, crossed the tropic of Capricorn, and entered the ‘variables’ of the southern hemisphere; and having reached the forks of the great Brazilian highway, that is to say, the point at which the stream of commerce separates into two principal branches, one passing around Cape Horn, and the other around the Cape of Good Hope, we had taken the left-hand fork. We had not proceeded far on this road, however, before we found upon examination of our bread-room, that the weevil, that pestilent little destroyer of bread-stuffs in southern climates, had rendered almost our entire supply of bread useless! It was impossible to proceeded on a voyage of such length, as that to the Cape of Good Hope, in such a dilemma, and I put back for Rio Janeiro, to obtain a fresh supply; unless I could capture it by the way. We were now in latitude 28° 01′, and longitude 28° 29′, or about 825 miles from Rio; some little distance to travel to a baker's shop. We were saved this journey, however, as the reader will presently see, by a Yankee ship which came very considerately to our relief.

For the next few days, the weather was boisterous and unpleasant—wind generally from the north-west, with a southeasterly current. Ships were frequently in sight, but they all proved to be neutral. On the 30th of June, the weather