VOYAGE TO GREENLAND. 
■113 
trophe ; and I learned at the same time, that the Cato, 
as well as other ships, had nearly shared the same 
fate, some of them having been lifted up by the ice, 
several feet above thek water line. The destruc- 
tion of the Thornton in lat. 79° N. was stated to 
have been progressive for about fifteen minutes, 
when its si^es yielding to the irresistible pressure, 
the ice formed a junction through the unfortunate 
wreck. Several other distressing occurrences were 
enumerated, some where the destruction had been 
completed within a minute after the ice on either 
side had come in contact with the vessel. 
This day several Sterna Hirundo, Linn., or sea- 
swallow, came flying round and over the ship, but 
beyond the reach of shot; they appeared extremely 
elegant birds on the wing, and were singularly 
attractive from their long tail-feathers which were 
extendedly forked. 
At four o'clock in the morning, the ice 
having opened on the north-west side of 
the bay, all the other ships went out and sailed 
away to windward, but we remained lying to, until 
all the duties of the Sabbath had been performed, 
when we sailed in the same direction ; about ten 
o'clock p. M., a thick fog came on, which made the 
navigation both difficult and dangerous. 
The weather clearing, we found our- 
selves in a bay of impenetrable ice^ of 
about six miles in depth, and with no inlet but that 
through which we came ; we therefore lost no time 
in making a retrograde course. Several unicorns 
I 
