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Updated: May 15, 2025
He, therefore, had the whole of the ship's bottom sheathed with thick hardwood planking, which was carried up above her water-line, as high as the ordinary floe-ice would be likely to reach.
"There's an open lead between them and the floe-ice," exclaimed Bolton in a hopeful tone of voice, seizing an ice-pole and leaping on the gunwale. "Look alive, men, with your poles," cried the captain, "and shove with a will."
We preferred the crab-eater to the Weddell, which is a very sluggish beast. The crab-eater seemed cleaner and healthier. The killer-whales were still with us. On the 8th we examined a spot where the floe-ice had been smashed up by a blow from beneath, delivered presumably by a large whale in search of a breathing- place. The force that had been exercised was astonishing.
At that moment an ominous noise was heard on the sea. The tide, in moving, caused the massive floe-ice to grate against that adhering to the shore. To the simple natives, the noise indicated something more sinister. "Hearest that?" Ahningnetty asked. "Yea," replied Papik, "Qulutaligssuaq, the monster who lives in the sea, cometh with his hammers." "He cometh to steal the children.
There was also the possibility of the pack being a limited strip of floe-ice unconnected with the shore, which, if it had been so, would have decided their fate. In these circumstances they all pushed on at their best speed.
"There's an open lead between them and the floe-ice," exclaimed Bolton in a hopeful tone of voice, seizing an ice-pole and leaping on the gunwale. "Look alive, men, with your poles," cried the captain, "and shove with a will!"
The dogs realized what was required of them, and that I would exact it of them in spite of what they would do, and they became submissive and pulled willingly, myself and the Esquimos doing our share at the upstanders. We got over the heavy floe-ice, to find ourselves confronted with jagged, rough ice, where we had to pickax our way.
The rising sea beat against the rocks and shingle and tossed fragments of floe-ice within a few feet of our boats. Once during the morning the sun shone through the racing clouds and we had a glimpse of blue sky; but the promise of fair weather was not redeemed. The consoling feature of the situation was that our camp was safe.
They knew, in a vague way, that winter would come early, but they had not counted on the big September storm that dashed their heavy-laden boats against the floe-ice, ultimately drove them ashore, and nearly cost the little party their lives.
Directly in their way, just beyond the line of floe-ice against which they were alternately thumping and grinding, lay a group of bergs. There was no possibility of avoiding them, and the only question was, whether they were to be dashed to pieces on their hard blue sides, or, perchance, in some providential nook to find a refuge from the storm.
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