540 FAMILY PHOCID.E. 



ting round with their gaffs, they shoved it by main force un- 

 der the adjoining ice. Smashing, breaking, and pounding the 

 smaller pieces in the course the vessel wished to take, room was 

 afforded for the motion of the larger pans. Laying out great 

 claws on the ice ahead when the wind was light the crew warped 

 the vessel on. If a large, strong pan was met with, the ice-saw 

 was got out. Sometimes, a crowd of men, clinging round the 

 ship's bows and holding on to the bights of ropes suspended 

 there for the i^urpose, would jump and dance on the ice, bend- 

 ing and breaking it with their weight, shoving it below the ves- 

 sel, and dragging her on over it with all their force. Tip to their 

 knees in water, as one piece after another sank below the cut- 

 water they still held on, hurrahing at every fresh start she made, 

 dancing, jumping, pushing, shoving, hauling, hewing, sawing, 

 till every soul on board was roused into excited exertion. . . . 

 They continued their exertions the whole day, relieved occasion- 

 ally by small open pools of water; and in the evening we cal- 

 culated that we had made about fifteen miles. It continued 

 foggy all day, and at night it began to rain. We had seen n<5 

 vessel since morning nothing but a dreary expanse of ice and 

 snow stretching away into the misty horizon." Tlie next day 

 "the wind was from the west, and the sky fine and clear. Sev- 

 eral vessels were near us, and several more ou the horizon. The 

 ice became thicker, stronger, and more compact. We made a 

 few miles in the morning and stuck fast the rest of the day in a 

 very large pan or field of ice, sawing, axing, prising, warping, 

 etc., etc., as yesterday."* 



This, in short, was the history of their daily experiences for 

 a week, at the end of which time they first heard the cry of the 

 Seals, and entered upon their work of slaughter. 

 . 3. In the Jan Mayen Seg,s. Seal-hunting in the icy seas about 

 Jan Mayen is conducted under similar conditions and in much 

 the same way as among the ice-floes to the eastward of New- 

 foundland. Lindeman, in his memoir on the Arctic fisheries 

 as prosecuted from the German seaports, gives a pretty full ac- 

 count of the vessels sailing from the Weser ports, selecting for 

 this purpose the "Hudson", J. H. Westermeyer, commander, as 

 a type, and not only describes her .special armature. for protec- 

 tion against ice, but her general outfit, including officers and 

 crew, the weapons employed, the commissariat, even to the 

 weekly bill of fare, the "watch", and daily life and duties on 



* Exciirs. in Newfoundland, vol. 1, pp. 261-263. 



