northward, when we got up the anchor and made sail. As the sun rose, we
passed Alexandria. I then went into the hold for the first time, and
there found my passengers pretty thickly stowed. I distributed bread
among them, and knocked down the bulkhead between the hold and the
cabin, in order that they might get into the cabin to cook. They
consisted of men and women, in pretty equal proportions, with a number
of boys and girls, and two small children. The wind kept increasing and
hauling to the westward. Off Fort Washington we had to make two
stretches, but the rest of the way we run before the wind.

Shortly after dinner, we passed the steamer from Baltimore for
Washington, bound up. I thought the passengers on board took particular
notice of us; but the number of vessels met with in a passage up the
Potomac at that season is so few, as to make one, at least for the idle
passengers of a steamboat, an object of some curiosity. Just before
sunset, we passed a schooner loaded with plaster, bound up. As we
approached the mouth of the Potomac, the wind hauled to the north, and
blew with such stiffness as would make it impossible for us to go up the
bay, according to our original plan. Under these circumstances,
apprehending a pursuit from Washington, I urged Sayres to go to sea,
with the intention of reaching the Delaware by the outside passage. But
he objected that the vessel was not fit to go outside (which was true
enough), and that the bargain was to go to Frenchtown. Having reached
Point Lookout, at the mouth of the river, and not being able to persuade
Sayres to go to sea, and the wind being dead in our teeth, and too
strong to allow any attempt to ascend the bay, we came to anchor in
Cornfield harbor, just under Point Lookout, a shelter usually sought by
bay-craft encountering contrary winds when in that neighborhood.

We were all sleepy with being up all the night before, and, soon after