OUR FATE DECIDED. 



459 



" To-morrow morning Captain B goes out for the object 



of visiting some point overlooking Davis's Strait, near the en- 

 trance to Field Bay, to determine what he must do on seeing how 

 the pack is. It is hoped that he will find the pack I saw ended; 

 but he says he has no doubt, from what I saw, that it will be im- 

 possible to get out this season ; that we must make up our minds 

 to stop here this winter. ■ He is already planning for the winter- 

 ing of his men. He says he will have to divide them among the 

 natives, as the ship has neither provision nor fuel sufficient to last 

 till she is again free from ice and can reach home. 



"Friday, October 18th, 1861. This morning, the first and all-im- 

 portant matter of our being obliged to winter here absorbs our at- 

 tention. It is the general subject of conversation fore and aft. 

 Captain B started off at 7 A.M., taking with him his princi- 

 pal officers, for the purpose of making a survey from Budington 

 Mountain* of the pack in Davis's Strait. At 9 15 A.M. he re- 

 turned, reporting that Eescue Harbor was so solidly frozen that 

 he could not get through it, and was obliged to make for another 

 point this side. At last he made a landing, and proceeded to an 

 eminence this side ; but it was not such a view as he desired to 

 make, though he saw enough to satisfy him that it would only be 

 running a terrible risk to attempt getting out this season. Cap- 

 tain B designs crossing the bay to the high land by Parker's 



Harbor, or near French Head, to-day or to-morrow, if the ice will 

 admit of it. 



# * # * -Jfr * * 



" October 20th, 1861. This morning the ice in the harbor was so 

 firm as to bear me up. As soon as I went on deck, long before 

 the sun was up, I made my way down the ship's side upon it. 

 The pack outside the bay and the new ice now nearly covering it 

 have us imprisoned. For nine months to come we are ice-bound / 

 Some of the men still think we shall get out, but I do not thin k 

 Captain B has now the remotest idea that we can. 



"Now (1 P.M.) the thermometer is at 13°, the sun shining 

 brightly, the sky cloudless. For three days now, had there been 

 a clear way before us, we could not have got out, for there has 



* Named by me after S. O. Budington, who was master of the George Henri/. 

 This mount, 500 feet high, is in lat. 62° 53' N., long. 64° 42' W. ; is three miles due 

 east of the George Henry Harbor, and a little over one mile northeast of the centre 

 of Eescue Harbor. 



