HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN WHALE FI:HERY. 105 



was to relieve them of tlieir icy barrier, whaling constantly being carried 

 ou by the boats, though necessarily under many adversities. 



On the 15th of August the wind came around to the westwanl, dri- 

 ving the ice still closer to the shore and compelling the vessels to work 

 close in to the land. The drift of the ice inland was so rapid that some 

 of the vessels were compelled to slip their cables, there being no time to 

 weigh anchor. By this event the fleet was driven into a u-rirrow strip 

 of water not over half a mile in width at its widest part. Here, scat- 

 tered along the coast for 20 miles, they lay, the water from 14 to 134 feet 

 deep, and ice as far as the lookouts at the mastheads could see. Wha- 

 ling was still carried on with the boats off Sea-Horse Island and Point 

 Franklin, although the men were obliged to cut up the whales on the 

 ice and tow the blubber to the ships. 



On the 25th a strong northeast gale set in and drove the ice to a dis- 

 tance of from four to eight miles off shore, and renewed attention was 

 '?iven to the pursuit of the whale. Up to this time no immediate dan- 

 ger had been anticipated by the captains beyond that incidental to their 

 usual sojourn in these seas. The Esquimaux, nevertheless, with the 

 utmost friendliness, advised them to get away with all possible speed as 

 the sea would not again open, but this was contrary to the Arctic expe- 

 rience of the whalemen, and they resolved to bold their position. 



On the 29th began the series of conflicting circumstances resulting in 

 the destruction of the fleet. A southwest wind sprang up, light in the 

 morning, but freshening so toward evening that the ice returned inshore 

 with such rapidity as to catch some of the ships in the pack. The rest 

 of the fleet retreated ahead of the ice, and anchored in from three to 

 four fathoms of water, the ice still coming in and small ice packing 

 around them. The heavy floe-ice grounded in shoal-water and between 

 it and the shore lay the ships, with scarcely room to swing at their an- 

 chors. 



On the 2d of September the big Comet was caught by the heavy ice 

 and completely crushed, her crew barely making their escape to the 

 other vessels. She was pinched until her timbers all snapped and the 

 stern was forced out, and hung suspended for three or four days, being 

 in the mean time thoroughly wrecked by the other vessels ; then the ice 

 relaxed its iron grip and she sunk. Still our hardy whalemen hoped 

 that the looked-for northeasterly gale would come, and felt greater un- 

 easiness on account of the loss of time than because of their present 

 peril. Their experience could not point to the time when the favoring 

 gale had failed to assure their egress. j::^othing but ice was visible off- 

 shore, however, the only clear water being where they lay, and that 

 narrowed to a strip from 200 yards to half a mile in width, and extending 

 from Point Belcher to two or three miles south of Wainright Inlet. The 

 southeast and southwest winds still continued, light from th^. former 

 and fresh from the latter direction, and every day the ice packed more 

 and more closely around the doomed vessels. 



