contact with any other floe, which, had it done, it would
probably have broken into fragments, and we should have forthwith
perished. All hands were too busy watching the ship to think much on
this subject. We watched, but we watched in vain.

If she was our own ship, Captain Rendall must have fancied that he had
come as far north as he had left us; and seeing the ice broken and
changed, and floes drifting about, he must have thought we had perished.
At all events, after an hour's earnest watching, the most sanguine were
compelled to acknowledge that the top-sails were gradually again sinking
in the horizon; and before long they were out of sight, and all hope of
escaping that year was at an end.

By this time we had been, as it were, somewhat broken in to expect
disappointments, so no one expressed his feelings so strongly as on the
former occasion. We were also obliged to think of means for securing
our present safety. Two things were to be considered. If we remained
on the floe, should it break up we must be destroyed; besides this, we
could procure no food nor fuel.

After Andrew had heard all of us express our opinions, he resolved to
quit the floe and retreat to the main ice. "We'll stay on the edge of
it for one day, or two if you wish it, and we'll keep a bright look-out
for a ship; but it's my opinion that the last has passed, and that we
had better make up our minds to winter on shore. The sooner we begin
our preparations the better chance we have of weathering out the time."

This plan being agreed to, two hands were sent to unstep the flagstaff
and bring it forward, while the rest of us dismantled our hut, and
dragged the boat to the edge of the floe nearest the shore. It was time
that we should be off, for the channel had already widened to half a
mile. Though the water was perfectly smooth, the boat, with all our
party and our stores, had as much in her as she could conveniently
carry.

A quarter of an hour served to carry us across, when we again hauled our
boat up; and choosing the highest hummock in the neighbourhood, we again
erected our flagstaff. Before, however, we began to build a hut, we
examined the condition of the ice round us, to ascertain whether there
was a probability of another floe breaking away with us. On finding it,
according to the opinion of the old hands, perfectly secure, we put up a
tent in the same manner as the last, though of rather a larger size.
This done, we