Page:Royal Naval Biography Marshall sp4.djvu/357

  on account of the quantity of young ice which formed in the canal, and especially about the entrance, where, before sun-set, it had become so thick that a passage could no longer be found for the detached pieces without considerable trouble in breaking it. At half-past 7 we weighed our anchors, and began to warp up the canal, but the northerly wind blew so fresh, and the people were so much fatigued, having been almost constantly at work for nineteen hours, that it was midnight before we reached the termination of our first day’s labour.

“All hands were again set to work on the morning of the 25th, when it was proposed to sink the pieces of ice, as they were cut, under the floe, instead of floating them out, the latter mode having now become impracticable on account of the lower part of the canal, through which the ships had passed, being hard frozen during the night. To effect this, it was necessary for a certain number of men to stand upon one end of the piece which it was intended to sink, while others, hauling at the same time upon ropes attached to the opposite end, dragged the block under that part of the floe on which they 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&deg;, and never higher than 16&deg;. At six, we began to move the ships. The Griper was made fast astern of the Hecla, and their crews being divided on each bank of the canal, with ropes from the Hecla’s gangways, soon drew them along to the end of our second day’s work.

Sunday the 26th. – “I should, on every account, have been glad to have made a day of rest to the officers and men; but the rapidity with which the ice increased in thickness, in proportion as the general temperature 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 spirited and cheerful manner in which my orders were complied with, as well as the skill which had now been acquired in the art of sawing 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 on either of the two preceding days. The whole length of this canal was 4082 yards, and the average thickness of the ice was seven inches.

“At half-past one,, 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. The ships were in five fathoms water, a cable’s length from the beach on the north-western side of the harbour, to which I gave the name of Winter Harbour; and I called the group of islands which we had discovered in the Polar Sea,