Breakfast over, Simmons went to work and routed out a spare fore-topgallant-mast, which he prepared for sending aloft, while the rest of the watch were busy clearing away the wreck forward; and by the time that the new spar was ready for swaying aloft we had overtaken the rest of the convoy, when the commodore sent away a boat, with the first lieutenant of the _Colossus_ in her, to receive my report.
