United States or Micronesia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
When Jean and Louis Cornbutte learnt this, they visited the hold and steward's room, to ascertain the quantity of provisions which still remained. The thaw would not come until May, and the brig could not leave the bay before that period. They had therefore five winter months before them to pass amid the ice, during which fourteen persons were to be fed.
She soon returned, lovely and decked out, to the company; and all the women kissed her on the check, while the men vigorously grasped her by the hand. Then Jean Cornbutte gave the signal of departure. It was a curious sight to see this joyous group taking its way, at sunrise, towards the sea.
Misonne had constructed, with the planks of the cabin, a sort of sledge for carrying the provisions, and the sailors drew it by turns. Jean Cornbutte led the expedition by the ways already traversed. Camps were established with great promptness when the times for repose came.
The "Froöern" had indeed been driven to a place forty miles from where Louis Cornbutte had taken up his winter quarters. There she was broken up by the icebergs floated by the thaw, and the castaways were carried, with a part of the débris of their cabin, on the southern shores of Shannon Island. They were then five in number Louis Cornbutte, Courtois, Pierre Nouquet, Jocki, and Herming.
Aupic also made one of their band, and held himself apart, with loud disapproval of all the new measures taken; but Louis Cornbutte, to whom his father had transferred the command of the ship, and who had become once more master on board, would listen to no objections from that quarter, and in spite of Marie's advice to act gently, made it known that he intended to be obeyed on all points.
"And no doubt dashed into a thousand pieces," said the mate, "as her crew could not manage her." "But these ice-fields," returned Penellan, "gave her an easy means of reaching land, from which she could not have been far distant." "Let us hope so," said Jean Cornbutte, interrupting the discussion, which was daily renewed between the mate and the helmsman. "I think we shall see land before long."
"Hurry, little one," replied Jean Cornbutte, "for the wind is north, and she sails well, you know, when she goes freely." "Have our friends been told, uncle?" asked Marie. "They have." "The notary, and the curé?" "Rest easy. You alone are keeping us waiting." At this moment Clerbaut, an old crony, came in. "Well, old Cornbutte," cried he, "here's luck!
These two cries were uttered at the same time, and Louis Cornbutte fell fainting into the arms of his father and Marie, who drew him towards the hut, where their tender care soon revived him. "My father! Marie!" cried Louis; "I shall not die without having seen you!" "You will not die!" replied Penellan, "for all your friends are near you."
Jean Cornbutte searched for some practicable passage, or at least some fissure by which a canal might be cut across the ice-fields, all along the route, but in vain. Towards evening the sailors came to the same place where they had encamped over night. There had been no snow during the day, and they could recognize the imprint of their bodies on the ice.
The pipe was carried out through one of the lateral walls, by a hole pierced in the snow; but a grave inconvenience resulted from this, for the heat of the stove, little by little, melted the snow where it came in contact with it; and the opening visibly increased. Jean Cornbutte contrived to surround this part of the pipe with some metallic canvas, which is impermeable by heat.
Word Of The Day