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Page 47
Poor old "Resolute"! All this gay company is gone who have made her
sides split with their laughter. Here is Harlequin's dress, lying in one
of the wardrooms, but there is nobody to dance Harlequin's dances. "Here
is a lovely clear day,--surely to-day they will come on deck and take a
meridian!" No, nobody comes. The sun grows hot on the decks; but it is
all one, nobody looks at the thermometer! "And so the poor ship was
left all alone." Such gay times she has had with all these brave young
men on board! Such merry winters, such a lightsome summer! So much fun,
so much nonsense! So much science and wisdom, and now it is all so
still! Is the poor "Resolute" conscious of the change? Does she miss the
races on the ice, the scientific lecture every Tuesday, the occasional
racket and bustle of the theatre, and the worship of every Sunday? Has
not she shared the hope of Captain Kellett, of McClure, and of the crew,
that she may _break out well!_ She sees the last sledge leave her. The
captain drives off his six dogs,--vanishes over the ice, and they are
all gone "Will they not come back again?" says the poor ship. And she
looks wistfully across the ice to her little friend the steam tender
"Intrepid," and she sees there is no one there. "Intrepid! Intrepid!
have they really deserted us? We have served them so well, and have they
really left us alone? A great many were away travelling last year, but
they came home. Will not any of these come home now?" No, poor
"Resolute"! Not one of them ever came back again! Not one of them meant
to. Summer came. August came. No one can tell how soon, but some day or
other this her icy prison broke up, and the good ship found herself on
her own element again; shook herself proudly, we cannot doubt, nodded
joyfully across to the "Intrepid," and was free. But alas! there was no
master to take latitude and longitude, no helmsman at the wheel. In
clear letters cast in brass over her helm there are these words,
"England expects each man to do his duty." But here is no man to heed
the warning, and the rudder flaps this way and that way, no longer
directing her course, but stupidly swinging to and fro. And she drifts
here and there,--drifts out of sight of her little consort,--strands on
a bit of ice floe now, and then is swept off from it,--and finds
herself, without even the "Intrepid's" company, alone on these blue seas
with those white shores. But what utter loneliness! Poor "Resolute "!
She longed for freedom,--but what is freedom where there is no law? What
is freedom without a helmsman! And the "Resolute" looks back so sadly to
the old days when she had a master. And the short bright summer passes.
And again she sees the sun set from her decks. And now even her topmasts
see it set. And now it does not rise to her deck. And the next day it
does not rise to her topmast. Winter and night together! She has known
them before! But now it is winter and night and loneliness all together.
This horrid ice closes up round her again. And there is no one to bring
her into harbor,--she is out in the open sound. If the ice drifts west,
she must go west. If it goes east, she must east. Her seeming freedom is
over, and for that long winter she is chained again. But her heart is
true to old England. And when she can go east, she is so happy! and when
she must go west, she is so sad! Eastward she does go! Southward she
does go! True to the instinct which sends us all home, she tracks
undirected and without a sail fifteen hundred miles of that sea, without
a beacon, which separates her from her own. And so goes a dismal year.
"Perhaps another spring they will come and find me out, and fix things
below. It is getting dreadfully damp down there; and I cannot keep the
guns bright and the floors dry," No, good old "Resolute." May and June
pass off the next year, and nobody comes; and here you are all alone out
in the bay, drifting in this dismal pack. July and August,--the days are
growing shorter again. "Will nobody come and take care of me, and cut
off these horrid blocks of ice, and see to these sides of bacon in the
hold, and all these mouldy sails, and this powder, and the bread and the
spirit that I have kept for them so well? It is September, and the sun
begins to set again. And here is another of those awful gales. Will it
be my very last? all alone here,--who have done so much,--and if they
would only take care of me I can do so much more. Will nobody come?
Nobody?.... What! Is it ice blink,--are my poor old lookouts blind? Is
not there the 'Intrepid'? Dear 'Intrepid,' I will never look down on you
again! No! there is no smoke-stack, it is not the 'Intrepid.' But it is
somebody. Pray see me, good somebody. Are you a Yankee whaler? I am glad
to see the Yankee whalers, I remember the Yankee whalers very
pleasantly. We had a happy summer together once.... It will be dreadful
if they do not see me! But this ice, this wretched ice! They do see
me,--I know they see me, but they cannot get at me. Do not go away, good
Yankees; pray come and help me. I know I can get out, if you will help a
little.... But now it is a whole week and they do not come! Are there
any Yankees, or am I getting crazy? I have heard them talk of crazy old
ships, in my young days.... No! I am not crazy. They are coming! they
are coming. Brave Yankees! over the hummocks, down into the sludge. Do
not give it up for the cold. There is coal below, and we will have a
fire in the Sylvester, and in the captain's cabin.... There is a horrid
lane of water. They have not got a Halkett. O, if one of these boats of
mine would only start for them, instead of lying so stupidly on my deck
here! But the men are not afraid of water! See them ferry over on that
ice block! Come on, good friends! Welcome, whoever you be,--Dane, Dutch,
French, or Yankee, come on! come on! It is coming up a gale, but I can
bear a gale. Up the side, men. I wish I could let down the gangway
alone. But here are all these blocks of ice piled up,--you can scramble
over 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!"
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