Soon I heard the soughing of the wind in the treetops, and then it became dead calm and everything was still, the only sound to be heard being the voices of the mates in the cabin and a few of the crew who were on board in the forecastle. Suddenly there was a vivid flash of lightning which seemed to last for minutes, followed by a crashing peal of thunder, and then the rain came down, as I have since heard it described, “like marline-spikes and fixed bayonets.”
I instantly freed myself from my fetters, and crawling across the deck got through a port into the forechains, and fast to the foremost lower dead-eye I found the painter of a canoe, into which I lowered myself carefully; and then cutting myself away from the _Santa Maria_ I let the canoe drift, lying down in her bottom so as not to be seen in any of the flashes of lightning, which were now nearly continuous.
I soon found that I could not remain still, for the rain was rapidly filling the canoe, and I had to sit up and bale with might and main to prevent her sinking. I could see, by the flashes of lightning, that I was rapidly leaving the neighbourhood of the schooners, and trusted that I might get out of the creek without being noticed; but unfortunately a man was sitting in one of the port-holes of the forts or blockhouses as I was passing between them, and saw me as the lightning shone on me. He instantly gave the alarm, and seizing his musket began firing at me. I got hold of my paddle and plied it for dear life to the best of my ability, and though I could see that the alarm was taken up on board, I managed to get out into the main stream without being hit.
Whilst in the creek I had not felt the force of the tornado; but the moment I was in the main stream the canoe, which I could but imperfectly manage, was twisted round by the force of the wind, and I found myself drifting rapidly towards the mouth of the river. From time to time the flashes of lightning showed me that I was passing near the shore, and that the mangrove bushes ran far out into the water. I managed in some manner, how I hardly know, to get the canoe in towards a clump of mangroves which projected somewhat, and caught hold of the suckers hanging from the branches and gradually hauled myself into the trees. I had just got my hands on the roots of one, when an extra squall of wind and rain came sweeping down, and the canoe being dragged from under my feet, I was left hanging to the tree, into which I scrambled. Having found a fairly commodious fork, I wedged myself in it, and tried to collect my scattered thoughts.