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The ice opening for a mile and a half alongshore on the 30th, we shifted the Hecla's berth about that distance to the southward, chiefly to be enabled to see more distinctly round a point which before obstructed our view, though our situation as regarded the security of the ship was much altered for the worse. In the afternoon it blew a hard gale, with constant rain, from the northward, the clouds indicating an easterly wind in other parts. This wind, which was always the troublesome one to us, soon brought the ice closer and closer, till it pressed with very considerable violence on both ships, though the most upon the Fury, which lay in a very exposed situation. Early on the morning of the 31st, as soon as a communication could be effected, Captain Hoppner sent to inform me that the Fury had been forced on the ground, where she still lay; but that she would probably be hove off without much difficulty at high water, provided the ex. ternal ice did not prevent it. A large party of hands from the Hecla being sent round to the Fury towards high water, she came off the ground with very little strain, so that, upon the whole, consider. ing the situation in which the ships were lying, we thought ourselves fortunate in having incurred no very serious injury. A shift of wind to the south. ward in the afternoon at length began gradually to slacken it, but it was not till six A.M. on the 1st of August that there appeared a prospect of making any progress. The signal to that effect was immediately made; but, while the sails were setting, the ice, which had at first been three quarters of a mile distant from us, was observed to be closing the shore The ships were cast with all expe

dition, in hopes of gaining the broader channel be. fore the ice had time to shut us up. So rapid, however, was the latter in this its sudden movement, that we had but just got the ships' heads the right way when the ice came boldly in upon us, being doubtless set in motion by a very sudden freshening of the wind almost to a gale in the course of a few minutes. The ships were now almost instantly beset, and in such a manner as to be literally helpless and unmanageable.

The sails were, however, kept set; and, as the body of ice was setting to the southward withal, we went with it some little distance in that direction. The Hecla, after thus driving, and now and then forcing her way through the ice, in all about three quarters of a mile, quite close to the shore, at length struck the ground forcibly several times. in the space of a hundred yards, and being then brought up by it, remained immoveable, the depth of water under her keel abaft being sixteen feet, or about a foot less than she drew. The Fury, continuing to drive, was now irresistibly carried past us, and we escaped, only by a few feet, the damage invariably occasioned by ships coming in contact under such circumstances. She had, however, scarcely passed us a hundred yards, when it was evident, by the ice pressing her in, as well as along the shore, that she must soon be stopped like the Hecla; and, having gone about two hundred yards farther, she was observed to receive a severe pressure from a large floe-piece forcing her directly against a grounded mass of ice upon the beach. After setting to the southward for an hour or two longer, the ice became stationary, no open water

being anywhere visible from the masthead, and the pressure on the ships remaining undiminished during the day. Just as I had ascertained the utter impossibility of moving the Hecla a single foot, and that she must lie aground fore and aft as soon as the tide fell, I received a note from Captain Hoppner, informing me that the Fury had been so severely" nipped" and strained as to leak a good deal, apparently about four inches an hour; that she was still heavily pressed both upon the ground and against the large mass of ice within her; that the rudder was at present very awkwardly situated; and that one boat had been much damaged. However, about high water, the ice very opportunely slacking, the Hecla was hove off with great ease, and warped to a floe in the offing, to which we made fast at midnight. The Fury was not long after us in coming off the ground, when I was in hopes of finding that any twist or strain by which her leaks might have been occasioned, would, in some measure, close when she was relieved from pressure and once more fairly afloat. My disappointment and mortification, therefore, may in some measure be imagined, at being informed by telegraph, about two A.M. on the 2d, that the water was gaining on two pumps, and that a part of the doubling had floated up. Presently after, perceiving from the masthead something like a small harbour nearly abreast of us, every effort was made to get once more towards the shore. In this the ice happily favoured us; and, after making sail, and one or two tacks, we got in with the land, when I left the ship in a boat to sound the place and search for shelter. The whole shore was more or less lined with grounded masses of

ice; but, after examining the soundings within more than twenty of them, in the space of about a mile, I could only find two that would allow the ships to float at low water, and that by some care in placing and keeping them there. Having fixed a flag on each berg, the usual signal for the ships taking their stations, I rowed on board the Fury, and found four pumps constantly going to keep the ship free, and Captain Hoppner, his officers and men, almost exhausted with the incessant labour of the last eightand-forty hours. The instant the ships were made fast, Captain Hoppner and myself set out in a boat to survey the shore still farther south, there being a narrow lane of water about a mile in that direction; for it had now become too evident that the Fury could proceed no farther without repairs, and that the nature of those repairs would in all probability involve the disagreeable, I may say the ruinous, necessity of heaving the ship down.

After

rowing about three quarters of a mile, we considered ourselves fortunate in arriving at a bolder part of the beach, where three grounded masses of ice, having from three to four fathoms water at low tide within them, were so disposed as to afford, with the assistance of art, something like shelter. Returning to the ships, we were setting the sails in order to run to the appointed place, when the ice closed in and prevented our moving, and in a short time there was once more no open water to be seen. We were therefore under the necessity of remaining in our present berths, where the smallest external pressure must inevitably force us ashore, neither ship having more than two feet of water to spare. One watch of the Hecla's crew were sent

round to assist at the Fury's pumps, which requi. red one third of her ship's company to be constantly employed at them.

The more leisure we obtained to consider the state of the Fury, the more apparent became the absolute, however unfortunate, necessity of heaving her down. Four pumps were required to be at work without intermission to keep her free, and this in perfectly smooth water, showing that she was, in fact, so materially injured as to be very far from seaworthy. One third of her working men were constantly employed, as before remarked, in this laborious operation, and some of their hands had become so sore from the constant friction of the ropes, that they could hardly handle them any longer without the use of mittens, assisted by the unlaying of the ropes to make them soft. As, therefore, not a moment could be lost, we took advan. tage of a small lane of water, deep enough for boats, which kept open within the grounded masses along the shore, to convey to the Hecla some of the Fury's dry provisions, and to land a quantity of heavy ironwork, and other stores not perishable; for the moment this measure was determined on, I was anxious, almost at any risk, to commence the lightening of the ship as far as our present insecu. rity and our distance from the shore would permit.

At two A.M. on the 5th, the ice began to slacken near the ships, and, as soon as a boat could be rowed alongshore to the southward, I set out, accompanied by a second from the Fury, for the purpose of examining the state of our intended harbour since the recent pressure, and to endeavour to prepare for the reception of the ships by clearing out the

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