196 Arctic and Antarctic Exploration [part i 
wall, threatened with destruction every moment. All the 
time Scoresby was in the crow's-nest. 
When the gale subsided it was found that there were 
%\ feet of water in the hold. At first an attempt was 
made at fathering, passing a thrummed sail under the 
leak. But it was found that 22 feet of the keel and 
9 feet of the garboard strake were broken and turned 
at right angles, so that the sail could not be passed under 
the leak. Then an attempt was made to heave the ship 
down alongside the ice-floe. Stores were landed on the 
ice, scuttles were caulked and hatches closed. Hawsers 
were passed under the bottom, clenched to the main- 
mast, and then led to purchases on the ice. The keel 
was in this way drawn to the edge of the floe, while 
anchors were suspended from the tops on the other side. 
The crews of other ships came to help. But the attempt 
had to be given up, though an effort to cut off the broken 
parts of the keel and garboard strake was successful, and 
it became possible to pass the thrummed sail under the 
leak. Half the cargo was given to another whaler, as 
the price of staying by the Esk on the way home ; and 
Captain Scoresby was welcomed and rewarded on his 
return for his splendid seamanship in saving the good 
ship under his command. 
In 1820 the Baffin was specially built at Liverpool, 
and Scoresby made commercial profit in her, as well as 
discovering and surveying part of the east coast of 
Greenland. In the same year he published his great 
work on the Arctic regions. He was devoted to science 
and corresponded with Sir Joseph Banks and Professor 
Jameson of Edinburgh. His book on the Arctic regions 
immediately became the standard work on the subject, 
and has not been superseded by anything of equal merit 
down to the present day. A few years after its publi- 
cation Scoresby resolved to terminate his successful career 
as a whaling captain and take holy orders. With this 
object in view he went to Queens' College, Cambridge, 
took his degree, was ordained, and became D.D. in 1839. 
For seven years, from 1840 to 1847, he was Vicar of 
Bradford, and after his retirement he lived chiefly at 
Torquay. He specially worked at terrestrial magnetism, 
but other branches of science received attention from 
