Having hastily completed their preparations for the voyage, Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Mr. and Mrs. Pitman sailed from Raiatea, on the 26th of April; and on the 5th of May, reached Rarotonga. But the sea was so tempestuous, that they did not attempt to land until the following day, when Mr. Williams experienced one of those perils and preservations, so many of which marked his subsequent history. “It is now,” writes Mr. Pitman, “fourteen years, on the 5th of the present month, (May, 1841), that he and I, with our families, first stepped on Rarotonga: a day never to be forgotten, but which almost proved fatal to him. The sea was running tremendously high; and, in the act of handing over his infant son, Samuel, he put his foot upon the gunwale of our boat, waiting the rising of the wave to catch hold of his son, when he was impelled forward with violence towards the side of the ship, with the child in his arms. My dear wife, perceiving his danger, caught hold of the skirt of his coat, and, with all her might, pulled him and his son into the boat, or they must have both been crushed to death. Mrs. Williams, sitting in the bottom of the boat with her face covered, did not perceive the danger, which may be regarded as a providential circumstance, for had she seen it, and made an effort to rescue him, I see no possibility of saving the boat from being upset.”