278 
LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES. 
concluding with an exhortation to all on board to take 
especial heed to the devices of “ certain creatures, with 
men’s heads, and the tails of fishes, who swim with 
bows and arrows about the fiords and bays, and live 
on human flesh.” 
On the 11th of May the ill-starred expedition 
got under weigh from Deptford, and saluting the 
king, who was then lying sick at Greenwich, put to sea. 
By the 30th of July the little fleet—three vessels in 
all—had come up abreast of the Loffoden islands, but 
a gale coming on, the u Esperanza” was separated from 
her consorts. Ward-huus—a little harbour to the east 
of the North Cape—had been appointed as the place of 
rendezvous in case of such an event, but unfortunately, 
Sir Hugh overshot the mark, and wasted all the 
precious autumn time in blundering amid the ice to the 
eastward. At last, winter set in, and they were obliged 
to run for a port in Lapland. Here, removed from all 
human aid, they were frozen to death. A year after¬ 
wards, the ill-fated ships were discovered by some 
Russian sailors, and an unfinished journal proved that 
Sir Hugh and many of his companions were still alive 
in January, 1554. 
