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Updated: May 15, 2025
They got only one seal, and that was a small one scarcely sufficient to afford a couple of meals to the dogs. They were "misfortunate entirely," as O'Riley remarked; and to add to their misfortunes, the floe-ice became so rugged that they could scarcely advance at all.
The "Ay, ay, sir," of the men was uttered with a heartiness that showed how powerfully this gleam of hope acted on their spirits; but a new damp was cast over them when, on gaining the open passage, they discovered that the bergs were not at rest, but were bearing down on the floe-ice with slow but awful momentum, and threatening to crush the ship between the two.
On the clearing up of a fog on the morning of the 24th, we saw a long chain of icebergs, extending several miles, in a N.b.W. and S.b.E. direction; and, as we approached them, we found a quantity of "floe-ice" intermixed with them, beyond which, to the westward, nothing but ice could be seen.
As each swell lifted around our rapidly dissolving berg it drove floe-ice on to the ice- foot, shearing off more of the top snow-covering and reducing the size of our camp. When the floes retreated to attack again the water swirled over the ice-foot, which was rapidly increasing in width. The launching of the boats under such conditions would be difficult.
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.
The fire died down and Père Antoine threw on more brushwood; the sun grew tall in the heavens and a rain cloud gathered in the west; the floe-ice caught in its passage round the bend, gasped and whined and, tearing itself free again, vanished down river out of sight.
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