THE "THAMES" AGROUND 377 



with rising fog which cleared off before noon. We were 

 crossing the river to get to the west of one of the islands, 

 when the current unexpectedly drifted us too near the 

 shore, and we found ourselves suddenly aground on a 

 sandbank, with a light wind and a strong current driving 

 us against the point of the island. We spent the whole 

 morning throwing overboard the ballast, and putting the 

 wood and cargo on board the Ibis, but as quickly as we 

 lightened the ship the water fell. Every now and then 

 we took an anchor out from the vessel in a boat, and 

 hauled in the cable with the steam winch. All our 

 efforts proved vain, the anchors all came home, the 

 bottom was evidently smooth ice, and the part of the 

 anchor which dragged on the ground was polished like 

 steel. All the afternoon we worked away, without 

 apparently the ghost of a chance. W r e tossed half the 

 wood overboard, filled the Ibis, hauled first at the bow 

 and then at the stern, ran the engines full speed ahead, 

 and then tried full speed astern, but the vessel was 

 aground somewhere about midships, and we vibrated on 

 a pivot, not gaining a single point. 



In the evening a few Ostiaks came across in a boat 

 to see what was the matter, and we set them to work to 

 clear the bunkers of wood, and move the remaining 

 ballast forward, hoping thus to raise the ship by the 

 stern. Meanwhile the sailors took out an anchor, with 

 three lengths of cable, and dropped it at a greater dis- 

 tance from the ship than they had hitherto done. It 

 was eleven o'clock by this time, the men were exhausted, 

 and this was our forlorn hope. We had all worked hard 

 since five o'clock (eighteen hours), in a hot sun and 

 amidst virulent mosquitoes (the Culex damnabilis of 

 Rae), and the captain now decided that if he failed in 

 this endeavour nothing more could be done. In the: 



