LAST VOYAGE OF CAPT. ROSS. 
645 
been desolation in its uttermost extreme. A dead and disheart¬ 
ening silence reigned around them, broken at intervals only by 
the sound of their own voices, or the deep howl of the solitary 
bear, prowling on the ice in quest of its prey. The philoso¬ 
phic mind might have employed itself with the speculation of 
the use or necessity of such a vast portion of the globe being 
rendered unserviceable for the maintenance of human or animal 
life, whilst the solitary outcasts of nature, which inhabit it,appear 
as if placed on the verge of the dominion of creation, to mark the 
boundary to which the plastic power of nature can extend. It 
was altogether a scene by no means calculated to raise the 
desponding spirits of the crew, for the prospect was before 
them, that the snow would be their death-bed, and their bones 
left bleaching in the northern blast, until consumed, perhaps, by 
the influence of a hundred winters—their dust wide scattered by 
all the winds of heaven, and lost in the unfathomable abyss of 
annihilation. 
It was not until the 23d of September, that they took their 
departure from Monument Beach, when they made a move out 
to the eastward, and bored the boats into the young ice; but it 
was not without the greatest difficulty that they got them out 
again, as the young ice had become so thick. This, however, 
may be considered to have been an attempt to reach the oppo¬ 
site shore, which was a distance of about forty-five miles, 
but it was that almost of the drowning man, who clings to the 
most fragile object, as the only remaining hope of existence. 
In this instance, however, fortune favored them, for they 
succeeded in getting back to Monument Beach; where, as the 
season was far advancing, and the provisions nearly exhausted, 
the men being put upon little more than two-thirds of a pound 
of bread and meat per day, they remained no longer than the 
first opportunity presented itself of finding their way back to 
Fury Beach. Fortunately a wind sprung up from the north¬ 
ward to clear the inlet to the southward, and the journey was 
begun, although under the most discouraging circumstances. 
The young ice was making so rapidly, that the men were 
obliged to keep the boats in a rolling motion, to prevent it from 
