414 M'CLURE'S EXPLORATIONS 



parties in 1851 might be at once set to work upon new 

 and unsearched coast-lines. 



The smallest pools of water now became rapidly cov- 

 ered with ice ; the eider-duck, the hardiest of Arctic birds, 

 was last seen on the 23d of September. On the 27th, 

 the temperature being then at zero, preparations were 

 begun for housing over the ship. These preparations 

 were made under circumstances that might well shake 

 the nerves of a strong man. As the ice surged, the 

 ship was thrown violently from side to side, now lifted 

 out of water, now plunged into a hole. " The crushing, 

 creaking, and straining," says Captain M'Clure, in his 

 log, "is beyond description ; the officer of the watch, 

 when speaking to me, is obliged to put his mouth close 

 to my ear, on account of the deafening noise." 



The officers had just time to congratulate themselves 

 upon the escape from past dangers, and to express 

 gratitude at having lost only thirty miles of latitude by 

 the drifting of the pack, when a change of wind set it 

 all again in motion. The 28th was spent in breathless 

 anxiety, as, helpless in their icy trammels, they swept 

 northward again toward the cliffs of Princess Royal 

 Island. 



These cliffs rose perpendicularly from the sea at the 

 part against which the ship appeared to be setting, and, 

 as the crew eyed them for a hope of safety, if the good 

 craft should be crushed against their face, they could 

 see no ledge upon which even a goat could have estab- 

 lished a footing, and an elevation of four hundred feet 

 precluded a chance of scaling them. To launch the boats 

 over the moving pack was their sole chance, and that 

 a poor one, rolling and upheaving, as it was, under the 

 influence of wind, tide, and pressure. 



" It looks a bad job, this time," inquiringly remarked 

 one of the sailors, as he assisted another in coiling dowa 



