187 
Voyage of Discovery to the Arctic Regions . 
block under that part of the floe on which the people stood. The 
officers of both ships took the lead in this employ , several of them 
standing up to their knees in water frequently during the day* 
with the thermometer generally at 12°, and never higher than l6‘ 8 ’. 
At 6 P. M. we began to move the ships. The Griper was made 
fast astern, and the Hecla and the two ships' companies being di - 
vided on each bank of the canal, with ropes from the Hecla’s gang- 
ways, soon drew the ships along to the end of our second day’s 
work. 1 should on every account have been glad to make this a 
day of rest to the officers and men ; but the rapidity with which 
the ice increased in thickness, in proportion as the general tempera- 
ture of the atmosphere diminished, would have rendered a day’s 
delay of serious importance. I ordered the work, therefore, to be 
continued at the usual time in the morning; and such was the spi- 
rited and cheerful manner in which this order was complied with, 
as well as the skill which had now been acquired in the art of saw- 
ing and sinking the ice, that, although the thermometer was at 6° 
in the morning, and rose no higher than 9* during the day, we had 
completed the canal at noon, having effected more in four hours 
than in either of the two preceding days. The whole length of 
this canal was 4082 yards, or nearly two miles and one-third, and the 
average thickness of the ice was seven inches. At half past 
one P. M., we began to track the ships along in the same manner as 
before, and at a quarter past three we reached our winter quarters, 
and hailed the event with three loud and hearty cheers from both 
ships’ companies.” P. 97- 
The whole of the masts were dismantled except the lower 
ones ~the boats, yards, masts, and rigging, were deposited in 
a shade erected for them on shore; and a housing raised over 
deck, as the covering of their winter’s habitation. The sun had 
not entirely deserted the parallel of Winter Harbour. He still 
shot a few uncertain beams from the southern horizon ; but even 
these were withdrawn on the 4th of November, and our voyagers 
were left in their dreary exile, with the certainty of losing the 
light of the sun for nearly three months, and of having only the 
twilight of an Arctic winter to guide them in their pursuits and 
amusements. The prospect, too, of being detained in a state of 
inaction for at least ten months, and the risk of an unusual se- 
verity of winter, which the summer heats might be unable to re- 
duce, must have presented even to the best regulated minds 
some pictures of the future, marked by various depths of out- 
line, but all filled up with much gloomy colouring. It is diffi- 
cult to classify the varieties of form in which true heroism is ge- 
nerally displayed. History and patriotic feeling have wisely 
thrown a splendour round that species of animal courage which 
