Page:The open Polar Sea- a narrative of a voyage of discovery towards the North pole, in the schooner "United States" (IA openpolarseanarr1867haye).pdf/122

 another quarter; and over the sea around us these pulsating lines of uplift, which in some cases reached an altitude of not less than sixty feet,—higher than our mast-head,—told of the strength and power of the enemy which was threatening us.

We had worked ourselves into a triangular space formed by the contact of three fields. At first there was plenty of room to turn round, though no chance to escape. We were nicely docked, and vainly hoped that we were safe; but the corners of the protecting floes were slowly crushed off, the space narrowed little by little, and we listened to the crackling and crunching of the ice, and watched its progress with consternation.

At length the ice touched the schooner, and it appeared as if her destiny was sealed. She groaned like a conscious thing in pain, and writhed and twisted as if to escape her adversary, trembling in every timber from truck to kelson. Her sides seemed to be giving way. Her deck timbers were bowed up, and the seams of the deck planks were opened. I gave up for lost the little craft which had gallantly carried us through so many scenes of peril; but her sides were solid and her ribs strong; and the ice on the port side, working gradually under the bilge, at length, with a jerk which sent us all reeling, lifted her out of the water; and the floes, still pressing on and breaking, as they were crowded together, a vast ridge was piling up beneath and around us; and, as if with the elevating power of a thousand jack-screws, we found ourselves going slowly up into the air.

My fear now was that the schooner would fall over on her side, or that the masses which rose above the bulwarks would topple over upon the deck, and bury us beneath them.