consumed all the money
I had left, but as I expected to return with ten times the sum, I made
no scruple of parting with it.

My crew consisted of about thirty men, all strong fellows: ten of them
Englishmen, and the remainder from my own country. We stood to the
northward, until we reached the ice, which floated high as mountains,
and steering in between it, we at last came to a fine open water, where
a large quantity of whales were blowing in every direction. Our boats
were soon hoisted out, and we were extremely fortunate, having
twenty-three fish on board, and boiled down before the season was over.

I now considered my fortune made; and the ship being full up to the
beams, we made all sail to return home. But a heavy gale came on from
the southward, which drove all the ice together, and our ship with it,
and we were in great danger of being squeezed to atoms. Fortunately, we
made fast in a bight, on the lee side of a great iceberg, which
preserved us, and we anxiously awaited for the termination of the gale,
to enable us to proceed. But when the gale subsided, a hard frost came
on, and we were completely frozen up, where we lay--the ice formed round
to the depth of several feet, and lifted the ship, laden as she was, out
of the water.

The English, who were experienced fishermen, told us, that we had no
chance of being released until next spring. I ascended to the
mast-head, and perceived that for miles, as far as the eye could scan
the horizon, there was nothing but one continued succession of icebergs
and floes inseparably united. Despairing, therefore, of any release,
until the cold weather should break up, I made all arrangements for
remaining during the winter. Our provisions were very short, and we
were obliged to make use of the whale oil, but it soon produced such
dysenteries, that it was no longer resorted to.

After two months, the cold became intense, and our fuel ran short. At
the end of three months the crew complained of scurvy, and could not
move about the decks. At the end of the fourth month, they had all died
except the chief harpooner, a fat porpoise of an Englishman, and myself.

The bodies remained on the deck, for the cold was so intense that they
would not have been tainted for centuries; and, as at the end of five
months, the provisions were all expended, we were again obliged to
resort to the whale oil.

The whale oil produced a return of our complaints, and having no other