“December 2. Drifting down the sound. Every thing getting ready for the chance of a hurried good-by to our vessels. Pork, and sugar, and bread put up in small bags to fling on the ice. Every man his knapsack and change of clothing. Arms, bear-knives, ammunition out on deck, and sledges loaded. Yet this thermometer, at -30°, tells us to stick to the ship while we can.
“This packing up of one’s carpet-bag in a hurry requires a mighty discreet memory. I have often wondered that seamen in pushing off from a wreck left so many little wants unprovided for; but I think I understand it now. After bestowing away my boots, with the rest of a walking wardrobe, in a snugly-lashed bundle, I discovered by accident that I had left my stockings behind.
“4 P.M. Brooks comes down while we are dining to say we are driving east like a race-horse, and a crack ahead: ‘All hands on deck!’ We had heard the grindings last night, and our floe in the morning was cut down to a diameter of three hundred yards: we had little to spare of it. But the new chasm is there, already fifteen feet wide, and about twenty-five paces from our bows, stretching across at right angles with the old cleft of October the 2d.
“Our floe, released from its more bulky portion, seems to be making rapidly toward the shore. This, however, may be owing to the separated mass having an opposite motion, for the darkness is intense. Our largest snow-house is carried away; the disconsolate little cupola, with its flag of red bunting, should it survive the winter, may puzzle conjectures for our English brethren.
“Mr. Griffin and myself walked through the gloom to the seat of hummock action abeam of the Rescue. A dark, hard walk: no changes. The crack, noticed some time ago as parallel to and alongside of the Rescue, has not opened. Her officers have brought their private papers on board the Advance, and such indispensable articles as may be needed in case of her destruction.
“Our ship’s head is toward a point of land to the northeastward, but her position changes so constantly that there is little use of recording it. Caught a fox this morning; have now two on board.
“Our bearings, taken by azimuth compass this morning at eleven, gave Cape Hurd, S. by W. ¼ W.; Western Bluff, of Rigsby’s Inlet, S.E. ¼ S.; Table-hill of Parry, S.E. by S. ½ S.; Cape Ricketts, E. by N.
“Wind changed at 9 P.M. to N.N.W.; thermometer, minimum, -26°; maximum, 22°; mean, 23° 82'.
“December 4, Wednesday. This morning showed us an interval of over two hundred yards already covered with stiff ice: so much for our chasm of last night! All around us is a moving wreck of ice-fields.