1. Autumn was passing away, the days were getting shorter, and in our immediate neighbourhood no movement in the ice was perceptible, save that we had drifted continuously towards the north-east; sometimes, though rarely, a fissure in the ice grew to the proportions of an “ice-hole,” only, however, to be quickly frozen over and present a surface for our skates. There lay the frozen sea, the picture of dull, hopeless monotony; shelter there was none. Our floe, though it seemed to combine the conveniences of a winter harbour, could not stand the test of closer observation, the illusion of such a notion must be short-lived. But many signs now indicated the insecurity of our position. Fields of ice in our neighbourhood cracked and split asunder, and piled-up masses floated round us, silent preachers, as it were, of the destruction which ice-pressure could produce.
2. A change, however, was soon to come over the scene. On the evening of October 12 we imagined that the cabin lamp oscillated, and consequently that our floe was in motion. On the same night we were conscious of a violent movement in the ice. A dreadful day was the 13th of October,—a Sunday; it was decisive of the fate of the expedition. To the superstitious amongst us the number 13 was clothed with a profound significance: the committee of the expedition had been constituted on February 13; on the 13th of January the keel of the Tegetthoff had been laid down; on the 13th of April she was launched; on the 13th of June we left Bremerhaven; on the 13th of July, Tromsoe; after a voyage of 13 days we had arrived at the ice, and on the 13th of October the temperature marked 16 degrees below zero (C.). In the morning of that day, as we sat at breakfast, our floe burst across immediately under the ship. Rushing on deck we discovered that we were surrounded and squeezed by the ice; the after-part of the ship was already nipped and pressed, and the rudder, which was the first to encounter its assault, shook and groaned; but as its great weight did not admit of its being shipped, we were content to lash it firmly. We next sprang on the ice, the tossing tremulous motion of which literally filled the air with noises as of shrieks and howls, and we quickly got on board all the materials which were lying on the floe, and bound the fissures of the ice hastily together by ice-anchors and cables, filling them up with snow, in the hope that frost would complete our work, though we felt that a single heave might shatter our labours. But, just as in the risings of a people the wave of revolt spreads on every side, so now the ice uprose against us. Mountains threateningly reared themselves from out the level fields of ice, and the low groan which issued from its depths grew into a deep rumbling sound, and at last rose into a furious howl as of myriads of voices. Noise and confusion reigned supreme, and step by step destruction drew nigh in the crashing together of the fields of ice. Our floe was now crushed, and its blocks, piled up into mountains, drove hither and thither. Here, they towered fathoms high above the ship, and forced the protecting timbers of massive oak, as if in mockery of their purpose, against the hull of the vessel; there, masses of ice fell down as into an abyss under the ship, to be engulfed in the rushing waters, so that the quantity of ice beneath the ship was continually increased, and at last it began to raise her quite above the level of the sea. About 11.30 in the forenoon, according to our usual custom, a portion of the Bible was read on deck, and this day, quite accidentally, the portion read was the history of Joshua: but if in his day the sun stood still, it was more than the ice now showed any inclination to do.
3. The terrible commotion going on around us prevented us from seeing anything distinctly. The sky too was overcast, the sun’s place could only be conjectured. In all haste we began to make ready to abandon the ship, in case it should be crushed, a fate which seemed inevitable, if she were not sufficiently raised through the pressure of the ice. About 12.30 the pressure reached a frightful height, every part of the vessel strained and groaned; the crew, who had been sent down to dine, rushed on deck. The Tegetthoff had heeled over on her side, and huge piles of ice threatened to precipitate themselves upon her. But the pressure abated, and the ship righted herself; and about one o’clock, when the danger was in some degree over, the crew went below to dine. But again a strain was felt through the vessel, everything which hung freely began to oscillate violently, and all hastened on deck, some with the unfinished dinner in their hands, others stuffing it into their pockets. Calmly and silently, amid the loud sounds emitted by the ice in its violent movement, the officers assumed and carried out the special duty which had been assigned to each in the contemplated abandonment of the ship. Lieutenant Weyprecht got ready the boats, Brosch and Orel cleared out the supply of provision to be taken in them; Kepes, our doctor, had an eye to his drugs; the Tyrolese opened the magazine, and got out the rifles and ammunition—I myself attended to the sledges, the tents, and the sacks for sleeping in, and distributed to the crew their fur coats. We now stood ready to start, each with a bundle—whither, no one pretended to know! For not a fragment of the ice around us had remained whole; nowhere could the eye discover a still perfect and uninjured floe to serve as a place of refuge, as a vast floe had before been to the crew of the Hansa. Nay, not a block, not a table of ice was at rest, all shapes and sizes of it were in active motion, some rearing up, some turning and twisting, none on the level. A sledge would at once have been swallowed up, and in this very circumstance lay the horror of our situation. For, if the ship should sink, whither should we go, even with the smallest stock of provisions?—amid this confusion, how reach the land, thirty miles distant, without the most indispensable necessaries?
4. The dogs, too, demanded our attention. They had sprung on chests, and stared on the waves of ice as they rose and roared. Every trace of his fox-nature had disappeared from “Sumbu.” His look, at other times so full of cunning, had assumed an expression of timidity and humility, and, unbidden, he offered his paw to all passers by. The Lapland dog, little Pekel, sprang upon me, licked my hand, and looked out on the ice as if he meant to ask me what all this meant. The large Newfoundlands stood motionless, like scared chamois, on the piles of chests.
5. About 4 P.M. the pressure moderated; an hour afterwards there was a calm, and with more composure we could now survey our position. The carpenter shovelled away the snow from the deck in order to inspect the seams. They were still uninjured. The knees and cross-beams still held, and no very great quantity of water was found in the hold. This result we owed solely to the strength of our ship and to her fine lines, which enabled her to rise when nipped and pressed, while her interior, so well laden as to become a solid body, increased her powers of resistance. Everything was again restored to its place, so that it was possible to go up and down the cabin stairs without great difficulty, and in the evening the water in the hold, which had risen 13 inches, was pumped out to its normal depth of 6 inches. We went down into the cabin to rest, but though thankful and joyful for the issue, our minds were clouded with care and anxiety. Henceforth we regarded every noise with suspicious apprehensions, like a population which lives within an area of earthquakes. The long winter nights and their fearful cold were before us; we were drifting into unknown regions, utterly uncertain of the end. When night came, we fell asleep with our clothes on, though our sleep was disturbed every now and then by onsets of the ice, recurring less frequently and in diminished force; but daily—and for one hundred and thirty days—we went through the same experiences in greater or lesser measure, almost always in sunless darkness. It was, however, a fortunate circumstance for us that we encountered the first assaults of the ice at a time when we were still able to see; for instead of the calm preparations we were able to make, hurry and confusion would have been inevitable had these assaults surprised us amid the Polar darkness.
AN OCTOBER NIGHT IN THE ICE.
6. Early in the morning of Oct. 14 we all met at breakfast, but on every face there lay an expression of grave thoughtfulness, for each of us was contemplating the long perspective of those dreary nights, in which we should drift without a goal in the awful wastes of the Frozen Sea. The speedy restoration of our floe was now our most earnest desire. It was only severe frost and heavy falls of snow—as we vainly imagined—which could cement the chaos of broken fragments around us and form from them a new floe; for as yet we had not learnt by experience, that severe cold in itself, unaccompanied with wind, is sufficient to break up the fields of ice, from the contraction which it causes. We deluded ourselves with another consolation—we imagined that the ice-pressures would cease as soon as we passed the eastern extremity of Novaya Zemlya, and that in the Sea of Kara we should drift without encountering the pressures, due, as we conceived, to our nearness to land. But vain also was this hope, for we were drifting not into the Sea of Kara, but towards the north-east. We should have found, even in that sea, that pressures from the ice may occur within the Frozen Ocean, however, as well as at its coasts. The masses of ice which caused our disasters probably came from that sea.