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Updated: June 17, 2025
How is that, Ned; shall we weather the southernmost point, think ye?" "Yes," answered Ned, "and plenty to spare, if there is no current to set us to leeward." The island was now to leeward of the ship, stretching along the horizon on her larboard beam, the northern extremity being well on her quarter, whilst the southern end, with an outlying reef, lay about three points on her lee-bow.
In this time of despair, it occurred to the fourth mate to send a man to the foremast, hoping, but scarce daring to think it probable, that some friendly sail might be in sight. The man at the foretop looked around him; it was a moment of intense anxiety; then waving his hat, he cried out, "A sail, on the lee-bow!"
With this view, and favored by the wind, a course was shaped for Lochswilly, and away we scudded under close-reefed foresail and main-topsail, followed by a tremendous sea, which threatened every moment to overwhelm us, and accompanied by piercing showers of hail, and a gale which blew with incredible fury. The same course was steered until next day about noon, when land was seen on the lee-bow.
At daybreak, the northermost land bore from us W.S.W. and seemed to end in a point, from which we discovered a reef running out to the northward as far as we could see. We had hauled our wind to the westward before it was light, and continued the course till we saw the breakers upon our lee-bow.
Ahead, and well on the lee-bow, appeared a jagged rock-point. Both men strained to it. "Amboy Point," Griffiths announced. "Plenty of water close up. Take the wheel, Jacobsen, till we set a course. Get a move on!" Running aft, barefooted and barelegged, the rainwater dripping from his scant clothing, the mate displaced the black at the wheel. "How's she heading?" Griffiths called.
I made no reply, but there all four of us, the captain and his three mates, stood looking anxiously into the vacant mist on our lee-bow, as if we expected every moment to behold our homes.
Suddenly there came a cry from the crow's-nest "There she blows!" Instantly every man in the ship sprang to his feet as if he had received an electric shock. "Where away?" shouted the captain. "On the lee-bow, sir," replied the look-out. From a state of comparative quiet and repose the ship was now thrown into a condition of the utmost animation, and, apparently, unmeaning, confusion.
Then on we rushed towards the iceberg, beating closely into the wind. Again it appeared on our lee-bow; the ship heeled over to the breeze. On we rushed a flaw of wind heading us would send us to destruction. The wind held steady. On, on we rushed, the foam flying over our bows and freezing as it fell. A towering cliff of ice appeared over our mast-heads still we hurried on.
The critical moment was now close at hand; the point which we were endeavouring to weather was less than a mile ahead, and still far enough on the lee-bow to justify the hope that we might yet go clear.
The frigate was standing her course before a light breeze, at the rate of four or five knots an hour, and Captain M was standing at the break of the gangway, talking with the first-lieutenant, when the man stationed at the mast-head called out, "A rock on the lee-bow!"
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