Alexandria Gazette

ROCKS OF THE ATLANTIC.—In a letter to a friend, the surgeon of her Majesty's schooner the Cockatrice relates a incident to which he was witness. It occurred on their way from Rio Janeiro to the River Platte, and deserves to be known that others may be on their guard, and also as it may possibly serve to explain why the Atlantic is laid down in various charts with so many shoals and rocks of uncertain bearings.—Vessels of less firm texture than the Cockatrice may have met with similar encounters without surviving to tell the tale, or especially if they occurred in the dark, may have been disabled, without ascertaining from what formidable antagonist they received the blow. "A very curious circumstance," says the writer "occurred as we were coming down with a whale. We observed a shoal of them sporting nearly ahead, and went forward and seated myself on the cathead, in order to observe them better, I had scarcely done so when we were in the middle of them; and a huge monster with his back out of water, coming a little oblique to our course, received the whole momentum of the vessel on his forehead. This must have been stunning, as we were going at the rate of about nine knots an hour, and the vessel felt as if she had struck on a mud bank. This however, did not intimidate him, for he immediately dived, and gave a tremendous lash with his tail across our bow and cutwater that made every timber in the vessel quiver. Every soul in the vessel rushed on deck alarmed and wondering; but the spirit of their dream was changed when the cause of it was explained and they saw the water in our wake red with blood, This occurrence ought to be published; and I dare say, could account for the numerous shoals and rocks with which the Atlantic is dotted.—Scotsman."