146 The Story of the New England Whalers 



the freshness of life. Seated on the floor in one 

 corner of the room was the corpse of an apparently 

 young man holding a steel in one hand and a flint 

 in the other, as if in the act of striking fire upon 

 some tinder that lay beside him. 



" In the forward part of the vessel several sailors 

 were found lying dead in their berths and the body 

 of a dog was crouched at the bottom of the gang- 

 way stairs." 



This ship with her dead crew had been pre- 

 served in the Arctic ice for thirteen years. Cap- 

 tain George E. Tyson relates a similar story in 

 his Arctic Experiences. 



If space may be allowed for one more tale of 

 adventure, contemplate the landing of Ronald 

 MacDonald on one of the Japanese islands in the 

 days before the awakening of that remarkable 

 people. One ship, the Lady Adams, had disap- 

 peared near the Japan coasts (1826), before Mac- 

 Donald determined to go ashore, and the circum- 

 stances made the whalemen believe that she had 

 struck a reef, and that her crew, after reaching 

 shore, had been killed. The ship Lawrence had 

 been wrecked near the coast, and the second mate 



