er them! Why do you stop? Do not be afraid. I will make you very
comfortable and jolly. Do not stay talking there. Pray come in. There is
port in the captain's cabin, and a little preserved meat in the pantry.
You must be hungry; pray come in! O, he is coming, and now all four are
coming. It would be dreadful if they had gone back! They are on deck.
Now I shall go home! How lonely it has been!"

It was true enough that when Mr. Quail, the brother of the captain of
the "McLellan," whom the "Resolute" had befriended, the mate of the
George Henry, whaler, whose master, Captain Buddington, had discovered
the "Resolute" in the ice, came to her after a hard day's journey with
his men, the men faltered with a little superstitious feeling, and
hesitated for a minute about going on board. But the poor lonely ship
wooed them too lovingly, and they climbed over the broken ice and came
on deck. She was lying over on her larboard side, with a heavy weight of
ice holding her down. Hatches and companion were made fast, as Captain
Kellett had left them. But, knocking open the companion, groping down
stairs to the after cabin they found their way to the captain's table;
somebody put his hand on a box of lucifers, struck a light, and
revealed--books scattered in confusion, a candle standing, which he
lighted at once, the glasses and the decanters from which Kellett and
his officers had drunk good by to the vessel. The whalemen filled them
again, and undoubtedly felt less discouraged. Meanwhile night came on,
and a gale arose. So hard did it blow, that for two days these four were
the whole crew of the "Resolute," and it was not till the 19th of
September that they returned to their own ship, and reported what their
prize was.

All these ten days, since Captain Buddington had first seen her, the
vessels had been nearing each other. On the 19th he boarded her himself;
found that in her hold, on the larboard side, was a good deal of ice; on
the starboard side there seemed to be water. In fact, her tanks had
burst from the extreme cold; and she was full of water, nearly to her
lower deck. Everything that could move from its place had moved;
everything was wet; everything that would mould was mouldy. "A sort of
perspiration" settled on the beams above. Clothes were wringing wet. The
captain's party made a fire in Captain Kellett's stove, and soon started
a sort of shower from the vapor with which it filled the air. The
"Resolute" has, howeve