THE FROZEN OCEAN. 2G9 



covered his cheeks and forehead, and veiled his eye-balls. 

 He had a pen in his hand, and a log-book lay before him, 

 the last sentence in whose unfinished page ran thus, ' No- 

 vember 11th, 1762. We have now been inclosed in the ice 

 seventeen days. The fire went out yesterday, and our 

 master has been trying ever since to kindle it again, without 

 success. His wife died this morning. There is no relief.' 



" Captain Warrens and his seamen hurried from the spot 

 without uttering a word. On entering the principal cabin 

 the first object that attracted their attention was the dead 

 body of a female, reclining on a bed in an attitude of deep 

 interest and attention. Her countenance retained the 

 freshness of life, and a contraction of the limbs alone 

 showed that her form was inanimate. Seated on the floor 

 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 which lay beside him. In 

 the fore part of the vessel several sailors were found lyinf 

 dead in their berths, and the body of a boy was crouched 

 at the bottom of the gangway stairs. 



"Neither provisions nor fuel could be discovered any- 

 where ; but Captain Warrens was prevented, by the super- 

 stitious prejudices of his seamen, from examining the 

 vessel as minutely as he wished to have done. He there- 

 fore carried away the log-book already mentioned, and 

 returning to his own ship, immediately steered to the 

 southward, deeply impressed with the awful example which 



