For three days, Norfolk burned. After a time, the fires were more isolate in their devouring; the town presented a spectacle of black chimney-stacks and scorched ruin as far as eye could see.

Lone shirtmen crouched upon the shore, firing at the fleet, then falling upon their bellies and disappearing before there could be answer to their impertinence. The great billows of smoke veiled their audacity.

At night, we might still hear them reveling in the ruins, disgraced by drink. They shouted in the burnt alleys.

Now the town hath fallen silent.

Over all hangs the cold brume of char, drifting across the water, lying still upon the decks of ships.

We go about our business in the sight of the desolation. The column of smoke does not break, but hovers above the city, as above the Cities of the Plain when smote for their sins.

There is much speculation, as might be imagined, as to whether we shall remain at Norfolk, now that it is razed, or whither we might go. If our officers have heard of the approach of troops sent down from Boston, or the march of our Indian allies to the north, gathered into war-parties to aid us in this our uneasy situation, they have not seen fit to tell us of this glad news. We await word of our next movement; none comes.

Men, when they speak, speak bitterly. Several tug at the stitching upon their shirts — Liberty to Slaves — which they believed talismanic, as the inscriptions of the African mallams are said to protect against all injury. They complain that they think ill of Lord Dunmore’s skill at sorcery.

The Crepuscule is becoming sickly. Several of our men have taken fevers, afflicted with some distemper which fell on the other ships and now visits itself upon ours. We await word of Jocko, but fear that he hath met his final reward. We tend our sick as best we can.

We sleep heartily both by day and by night.