CHAPTER XX

Summary

Towards evening, with a very light wind, we were passing along at some distance from the edge of the ice of Batty Bay, which was, just as in the other two places, closed against us. I was sitting in the after-cabin, talking to the commander, and reading, when, suddenly, I heard a cry on deck, from some of the men, that a gun had been fired on shore close to the bay. Capt. Forsyth, on coming up, gave orders to run closer in, and to clear away the howitzer, and fire it. I immediately took the best glass in my hand, and went aloft, most anxiously and narrowly examining the land, without perceiving the slightest signs of anything to denote either life, or even vegetation. Directly the report of our own gun had died away, I strained my ear to try and catch any answering signal; but not the faintest sound of anything could I, or any one else, now hear; and, accordingly we presumed that what had been heard was, either the fall of a piece of rock, or the collision of some heavy ice. We, therefore, once more stood on our course, and at ten o'clock, with foggy weather, ice stretching more out from the land, and myself dispirited, as well as still fatigued and needing sleep, I retired for the night.

Upon going on deck the following morning, at seven, I found we were running along the edge of the ice nearest the land, and in a thick fog The wind was light, and had carried us down as far as off “Fury Beach.”