504 ARCTIC VOYAGES. Chap. XIII. 



not," says Back, " how many cheers commemorated 

 the occasion." It was, indeed, as he says, " a scene 

 not to be forgotten by the spectators." 



The whole voyage, in fact, was of a nature so ex- 

 traordinary and unparalleled in the history of voy- 

 ages, ancient and modern, as not to be forgotten 

 even by the readers of it, still less by the spectators. 

 A ship actually cradled in the ice for four consecutive 

 months and dragged about utterly helpless, as indeed 

 she had been full six months before, wedged im move- 

 ably in or on floes of ice, after a previous month's 

 severe exertions on the part of the officers and men to 

 extricate her, so long as sails and warps were of any 

 avail — such a case, it may confidently be repeated, 

 has no parallel. To pass a winter among ice in a 

 ship firmly fixed in a harbour, or close to the shore, 

 quietly and without hard labour on the part of the 

 men, and with all their comforts about them, has 

 not been found disagreeable ; but to winter in a 

 ship which for ten long months was tossed about 

 amidst interminable ice in the wide ocean, always 

 in motion, and unceasingly threatened to be crushed 

 to atoms, when every soul on board muse inevitably 

 have perished — such a case cannot be contemplated 

 without the strongest feelings of compassion for the 

 helpless sufferers. And it is highly creditable and 

 most praiseworthy to officers and men, and more 

 particularly to the former, that by their steady and 

 unrepining conduct they prevented despondency 



