about midnight
By dark we had succeeded in carrying up thirty or forty coconut branches , and covering our sleeping place over in a more satisfactory manner , though we were every now and then chilled to the bone by the stinging rain . Our rifles , matches , tobacco , and a few biscuits , we placed in a dry spot , and then built up a small but hot fire of roots under the shelter , and , after eating a meal of coconut and biscuit , we filled our pipes , piled on more roots , and sat by the fire drying our clothes , and listening to the wild uproar of wind and sea , congratulating ourselves upon being in a spot where we were at least safe from the wind , for our camp was at least eight or ten feet below the general level of the island , both on its windward and leeward sides . All that night the wind blew with terrific violence , and the noise of the surf thrashing upon the coral barriers of the island was something indescribable . At about midnight , just after a lull succeeded by a heavy fall of rain , the wind hauled round two or three points to the southward , and , if possible , blew with still greater violence . The crashing of trees mingling with the demoniacal shriek of the hurricane , was enough to disturb the mind of the bravest ; but my companion lay quietly beside the fire , smoking his pipe and talking to me as he would had we been seated at the supper table on board the _ Fray Bentos _ . Yet that he was deeply anxious about our ship-mates I well knew , when , bidding me good-night , he laid his great frame upon the sand and went to sleep . By dawn on the following morning , the hurricane had lost its strength and settled down into a hard gale from the north-east .