SHIP IMMOVEABLE. 83 



not more than one hundred and thirty-six miles ; 

 so that with but a moderate share of westerly 

 winds to open the ice from the land, there was 

 still good reason to look forward to the accom- 

 plishment of the passage before the close of the 

 season, though the thermometer was as low as 

 20° + in the night, and but 27° + during the 

 warmer part of the day. Some hours elapsed 

 without the slightest variation in the ice, but 

 at 6 h p. m. an extraordinary movement took 

 place, which with astonishing celerity dispersed 

 it inshore so much as to leave a wide and long 

 lane, and we were not without hope that a 

 branch of it might even have reached us. Not, 

 however, that we waited for such a consum- 

 mation without putting our shoulders to the 

 wheel ; for, besides the sails well filled with a 

 fresh breeze, our strongest hawsers were fas- 

 tened to the ice, and then hove round by the 

 capstan. The united force was of course very 

 great, and no device was left untried to heave 

 the ship ahead; but so firmly had the ' sludge' 

 been frozen quite round the bends, that all our 

 efforts were unavailing, and not an inch could 

 we stir her. To see open water within one 

 hundred yards, and yet be unable to reach it, 

 was a type of the torment of poor Tantalus : but 

 so it was, and there was nothing left but to sub- 



g 2 



