178 LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES. [IX.- 



first, be concluded that some loadstone reck beneath the 

 sea must have attracted the keel of his ship, and kept her 

 stationary. 



The next five days were spent in a continual struggle 

 with the ice. On referring to our log, I see nothing but a 

 repetition of the same monotonous observations. 



" July 31st. — Wind W. by S. — Courses sundry to clear ice.'' 



" Ice very thick." 



" These twenty-four hours picking our way through ice." 



"August 1 st. — Wind W. — courses variable — foggy — con- 

 tinually among ice these twenty-four hours." 



And in Fitz's diary, the discouraging state of the weather 

 is still more pithily expressed : — 



'"August 2nd. — Head wind — sailing westward — large hum- 

 mocks of ice ahead, and on port bow, i. e. to the westward 

 — hope we may be able to push through. In evening, ice 

 gets thicker ; we still hold on — fog comes on — ice getting 

 thicker — wind freshens — we can get no farther — ice impass- 

 able, no room to tack — struck the ice several times — 

 obliged to sail S. and W. — things look very shady." 



Sometimes we were on the point of despairing altogether, 

 then a plausible opening would show itself as if leading to- 

 wards the land, and we would be tempted to run down it until 

 we found the field become so closely packed, that it was 

 with great difficulty we could get the vessel round, — and 

 only then at the expense of collisions, which made the little 

 craft shiver from stem to stern. Then a fog would come on 

 — so thick, you could almost cut it like a cheese, — and thus 

 render the sailing among the loose ice very critical indeed : 

 then it would fall dead calm, and leave us, hours together, 

 muffled in mist, with no other employment than chess or 

 hopscotch. It was during one of those intervals of quiet 

 that I executed the annexed work of art, which is intended 

 to represent Sigurdr, in the act of meditating a complicated 

 gambit for the Doctor's benefit. 



About this period Wilson culminated. Ever since leaving 

 Bear Island he had been keeping a carnival of grief in the 



