Time hung heavier than ever after that. Death is at all time a terrible visitant, but in such a place and under such circumstances it was tenfold more awful than usual. The blank in so small a band was a great one. It would perhaps have depressed them more than it did had their own situation been less desperate. But they had too fierce a battle to fight with disease, and the midnight gloom, and the bitter frost, to give way to much feeling about him who was gone.

Thus the long winter passed heavily away.

The sun came back at last, and when he came his beams shone upon a pale, shattered, and heart-weary band of men. But with his cheering light came also hope, and health soon followed in his train. Let young Gregory’s journal tell the rest of our story, little of which now remains to be told.

“February 21st.—I have to record, with joy and gratitude, that the sun shone on the peaks of the ice-bergs to-day. The first time it has done so since October last. By the end of this month we shall have his rays on deck. I climbed to the top of a berg and actually bathed in sunshine this forenoon! We are all quite excited by the event, some of us even look jolly. Ah! what miserable faces my comrades have! so pale, so thin! We are all as weak as water. The captain and I are the strongest. Baker is also pretty well. Crofts and Davis are almost useless, the rest being quite helpless. The captain cooks, Baker and I hunt, Crofts and Davis attend to the sick. Another month of darkness would have killed the half of us.

“March 10th.—I shot a bear to-day. It did my heart good to see the faces of the men when I brought them the news and a piece of the flesh! The cold is not quite so intense now. Our coldest day this year has been the 17th of January. The glass stood at 67 degrees below zero on that morning. What a winter we have had! I shudder when I think of it. But there is more cause to be anxious about what yet lies before us. A single bear will not last long. Many weeks must pass before we are free. In June we hope to be released from our ice-prison. Fresh meat we shall then have in abundance. With it strength will return, and then, if God permits, we shall attempt to continue our voyage northward. The captain is confident on the point of open water round the Pole. The men are game for anything in spite of their sad condition.”

Thus wrote Gregory at that date. Many weeks later we find him writing as follows:

“June 15th.—Free at last! The ice has been breaking up out at sea for some time past. It gave way in Refuge Harbour yesterday, and we warped out in the night. Everything is ready to push north again. We have been feeding heartily for many weeks on walrus, seals, wild-fowl, and last, but not least, on some grasses which make bad greens, but they have put scurvy to flight. All the men are well and strong and fit for hard work—though nothing like what they were when we first came here. Could it be otherwise? There are some of us who will carry the marks of this winter to our graves. The bright beautiful sunshine shines now, all day and all night, cheering our hearts and inspiring hope.

“June 16th.—All is lost! How little we know what a day may bring forth! Our good little brig is gone, and we are here on the ice without a thing in the world except the clothes on our backs. I have saved my note-book, which chanced to be in my breast-pocket when the nip took place. How awfully sudden it was! We now appreciate the wise forethought of Captain Harvey in sending the large boat to Forlorn-Hope Bay. This boat is our last and only hope. We shall have to walk forty miles before we reach it.

“Our brig went down at three o’clock this afternoon. We had warped out into the floes to catch a light breeze that was blowing outside. For some time we held on steadily to the northward, but had not got out of sight of our winter quarters when a stream of ice set down upon us and closed in all around. At first we thought nothing of this, having escaped so many dangers of the kind last autumn, but by degrees the pressure increased alarmingly. We were jammed against a great ice-field which was still fast to the shore. In a few moments the sides of our little vessel began to creak and groan loudly. The men laboured like tigers at the ice-poles, but in vain. We heard a loud report in the cabin. No one knows what it was, but I suppose it must have been the breaking of a large bolt. At any rate it was followed by a series of crashes and reports that left no doubt in our minds as to what was going on. The ice was cracking the brig as if she had been a nut-shell. ‘Save yourselves, lads!’ cried the captain. One or two of the men made a rush to the hatchway, intending to run below and save some of their things. I ran to the cabin-ladder in the hope of saving our log-book and journals, but we all started back in horror, for the deck at that moment burst open almost under our feet. I cast one glance down through the opening into the hold. That glance was sufficient. The massive timbers and beams were being crushed together, doubled up, split, and shivered, as if they had been rotten straws! In another moment I was on the ice, where the whole crew were assembled, looking on at the work of destruction in solemn silence.

“After bursting in the vessel’s sides the ice eased off, and she at once began to settle down. We could hear the water rushing furiously into the hold. Ten minutes later she was gone! Thus end our hopes of farther discovery, and we are now left to fight our way in an open boat to the settlements on the south coast of Greenland. We have little time to think. Prompt action must be our watchword now, if we would escape from this world of ice.

“July 20th.—I have not entered a line in this journal since our vessel was lost. Our work has been so severe, and our sufferings so great, that I have had no heart for writing. Our walk to the place where we left the boat was a hard one, but we were cheered by finding the boat all safe, and the provisions and stores just as we left them. There was not enough to last out the voyage, but we had guns and powder. It is in vain to attempt to describe the events of the last few weeks. Constant, and hard, and cold work—at the oars, with the ice-poles—warping, hauling, and shoving. Beset by ice; driving before storms; detained by thick fogs; often wet to the skin; always tired, almost starving—such has been our fate since that sad day when our brig went down. And yet I don’t think there is one of our party who would not turn about on the spot and renew our voyage of discovery, if he only got a chance of going in a well-appointed vessel. As it is, we must push on. Home! home! is our cry now.

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