“The deuce!” said Shandon. “You know all about it, I see.”
“More or less,” answered the doctor. “In my reading I have come across the works of Parry, Ross, Franklin; the reports of MacClure, Kennedy, Kane, MacClintock; and some of it has stuck in my memory. I might add that MacClintock, on board of the Fox, a propeller like ours, succeeded in making his way more easily and more directly than all his predecessors.”
“That’s perfectly true,” answered Shandon; “that MacClintock is a good sailor; I have seen him at sea. You might also say that we shall be, like him, in Davis Strait in the month of April; and if we can get through the ice our voyage will be very much advanced.”
“Unless,” said the doctor, “we should be as unlucky as the Fox in 1857, and should be caught the first year by the ice in the north of Baffin’s Bay, and we should have to winter among the icebergs.”
“We must hope to be luckier, Mr. Shandon,” said Johnson; “and if, with a ship like the Forward, we can’t go where we please, the attempt must be given up forever.”
“Besides,” continued the doctor, “if the captain is on board he will know better than we what is to be done, and so much the better because we are perfectly ignorant; for his singularly brief letter gives us no clue to the probable aim of the voyage.”
“It’s a great deal,” answered Shandon, with some warmth, “to know what route we have to take; and now for a good month, I fancy, we shall be able to get along without his supernatural intervention and orders. Besides, you know what I think about him.”
“Ha, ha!” laughed the doctor; “I used to think as you did, that he was going to leave the command of the ship in your hands, and that he would never come on board; but—”
“But what?” asked Shandon, with some ill-humor.
“But since the arrival of the second letter, I have altered my views somewhat.”
“And why so, doctor?”
“Because, although this letter does tell you in which direction to go, it still does not inform you of the final aim of the voyage; and we have yet to know whither we are to go. I ask you how can a third letter reach us now that we are on the open sea. The postal service on the shore of Greenland is very defective. You see, Shandon, I fancy that he is waiting for us at some Danish settlement up there—at Holsteinborg or Upernavik. We shall find that he has been completing the supply of seal-skins, buying sledges and dogs—in a word, providing all the equipment for a journey in the arctic seas. So I shall not be in the least surprised to see him coming out of his cabin some fine morning and taking command in the least supernatural way in the world.”
“Possibly,” answered Shandon, dryly; “but meanwhile the wind’s freshening, and there’s no use risking our topsails in such weather.”
Shandon left the doctor, and ordered the topsails furled.
“He still clings to that idea,” said the doctor to the boatswain.
“Yes,” was the answer, “and it’s a pity; for you may very well be right, Dr. Clawbonny.”
Towards the evening of Saturday the Forward rounded the Mull of Galloway, on which the light could be seen in the northeast. During the night they left the Mull of Cantire to the north, and on the east Fair Head, on the Irish coast. Towards three o’clock in the morning, the brig, passing Rathlin Island on its starboard quarter, came out from the North Channel into the ocean.
That was Sunday, April 8. The English, and especially sailors, are very observant of that day; hence the reading of the Bible, of which the doctor gladly took charge, occupied a good part of the morning.
The wind rose to a gale, and threatened to drive the ship back upon the Irish coast. The waves ran very high; the vessel rolled a great deal. If the doctor was not seasick, it was because he was determined not to be, for nothing would have been easier. At midday Malin Head disappeared from their view in the south; it was the last sight these bold sailors were to have of Europe, and more than one gazed at it for a long time who was doubtless fated never to set eyes on it again.
By observation the latitude then was 55° 57′, and the longitude, according to the chronometer, 7° 40′.1
The gale abated towards nine o’clock of the evening; the Forward, a good sailer, kept on its route to the northwest. That day gave them all a good opportunity to judge of her seagoing qualities; as good judges had already said at Liverpool, she was well adapted for carrying sail.
During the following days, the Forward made very good progress; the wind veered to the south, and the sea ran high. The brig set every sail. A few petrels and puffins flew about the poop-deck; the doctor succeeded in shooting one of the latter, which fortunately fell on board.
Simpson, the harpooner, seized it and carried it to the doctor.
“It’s an ugly bird, Dr. Clawbonny,” he said.
“But then it will make a good meal, my friend.”
“What, are you going to eat it?”
“And you shall have a taste of it,” said the doctor, laughing.
“Never!” answered Simpson; “it’s strong and oily, like all seabirds.”
“True,” said the doctor; “but I have a way of dressing such game, and if you recognize it to be a seabird, I’ll promise never to kill another in all my life.”
“So you are a cook, too, Dr. Clawbonny?” asked Johnson.
“A learned man ought to know a little of everything.”
“Then take care, Simpson,” said the boatswain; “the
