For we consume away in thy displeasure: and are afraid at thy wrathful indignation.
Thou has set our misdeeds before thee: and our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.
For when thou art angry all our days are gone: we bring our years to an end, as it were a tale that is told.
The days of our age are three-score years and ten; and though men be strong that they come to fourscore years: yet is their strength then but labour and sorrow; so soon passeth it away, and we are gone.
But who regardeth the power of thy wrath: for even thereafter as a man feareth, so is thy displeasure.
So teach us to number our days: that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
Turn thee again, O Lord, at the last: and be gracious unto thy servants.
O satisfy us with thy mercy, and that soon: so shall we rejoice and be glad all the days of our life.
Comfort us again now after the time that thou has plagued us: and for the years wherein we have suffered adversity.
Shew thy servants thy work, and their children thy glory.
And the glorious Majesty of the Lord our God be upon us: prosper thou the work of our hands upon us, O prosper thou our handy-work.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.
And all of us shivering survivors spake, Amen.
There was a Silence then. The snow blew softly against Us. The black water lapped with a Hungry Sound. The ice Groaned and Shifted slightly beneath our feet.
All of us, I believe, were Thinking that these words were a Eulogy and Farewell for each one of us. Up until this Day and the loss of Lieutenant Little’s boat with all his men – including the irreplaceable Mr. Reid and the universally liked Mr. Peglar – I suspect that many of us still thought that we might Live. Now we knew that the odds of that had all but Disappeared.
The long awaited and Universally Cheered Open Water was a vicious Trap.
The Ice will not give us up.
And the creature from the ice will not allow us to leave.
Bosun Johnson called, Ship’s Company – OFF hats! We tugged off our motley and filthy head coverings.
Know that our Redeemer liveth, said Captain Crozier in that Husky Rasp that now passed for his voice. And that he shalt stand at the Latter Day upon the Earth. And though after our sin Worms destroy our bodies, yet in our flesh shall we see God: whom we shall see for ourselves, and our eyes shall behold, and not another.
O Lord, accept your Humble Servants here Ice Master James Reid, Captain of the Foretop Harry Peglar, and their Unknown Crewmate into your Kingdom, and with the two we can Name, please accept the Souls of Lieutenant Edward Little, Seaman Alexander Berry, Seaman Henry Sait, Seaman William Wentzall, Seaman Samuel Crispe, Seaman John Bates, and Seaman David Sims.
When our day comes to join Them, Lord, please allow us to join them in Thy Kingdom.
Hear our prayer, O Lord, for our Shipmates and Our Selves and for all Our Souls. And with thine ears consider our calling: hold not thy peace at our tears. Spare us a little, that we may recover our strength; before we also go hence and be no more.
Amen.
Amen, we all whispered.
The bosuns lifted the canvas Burial Shrouds and dropped them into the black water, where they Sank within Seconds. White bubbles rose like Final Efforts to Speak from our departed Shipmates, then the surface of the lake grew Black and Still again.
Sergeant Tozer and two Marines fired a single volley from their muskets.
I saw Captain Crozier stare at the black lake with an expression rich with suppressed Emotions. We will go now, he said Firmly to us, to all of us, to this slumped and sad and Mentally Defeated party. We can haul those sledges and boats a Mile before it is time to sleep. We will head Southeast toward the mouth of Back’s River. The going will be Easier out here on the ice.
As it turned out, the going was much Harder on the ice. In the End, it was Impossible, not because of the usual Pressure Ridges and anticipated Difficulty transporting the boats, although that was Increasingly Problematic because of our Hunger, Illness, and Weakness, but because of the Breaking Ice and the Thing in the Water.
Moving in Relays as Usual but with Nine Fewer Men on our Expedition Muster that Long Arctic Evening of 10 July, we Progressed much less than a Mile before stopping to pitch tents on the Ice and to Sleep at last.
That sleep was Interrupted less than Two Hours later when the Ice suddenly began to crack and shift. The entire mass bobbed up and down. It was a most Disquieting Experience and we all scrambled to the exits of our Respective Tents and milled in some Confusion. Seamen began to strike the tents and make ready to pack the Boats until Captain Crozier, Mr. Couch, and First Mate Des Voeux shouted them into stillness. The officers pointed out that there were no signs of cracks in the ice near us, only this Movement.
After fifteen minutes or so of this, the ice Quieted until the Surface of the Frozen Sea under us once again felt as firm as Stone. We crawled back into our tents.
An hour later, the Bobbing and Cracking began again. Many of us repeated our earlier rush out into the Blowing Wind and dark, but the Braver Seamen stayed in their sleeping bags. Those of us who had Taken Fright crawled back into the Ill-Smelling and Crowded little tents – filled as they were with Snores, Sleeping Exhalations, Overlapping Bodies in Wet Bags, and the Ripeness of men who had not changed their Clothes in several months – with abashed countenances. Fortunately, it was too Dark for anyone to notice.
All that next day we struggled to haul the Boats forward to the Southeast across a Surface no more solid than a tightly drawn skin of India Rubber. Cracks were appearing – some showing six feet thickness of ice and more between the Surface and the Sea – but our sense of crossing a Plain of Ice had disappeared, replaced with the Reality of moving from Floe to Floe on an Undulating ocean of white.
I should Record here that on that Second Evening after we left the Enclosed Ice Lake, I was catching up with my Duty of going through the Dead Men’s personal belongings, most of which had been Left Behind in our General Stores when Lieutenant Little’s reconnaissance group left in their whaleboat, and had come to Captain of the Foretop Peglar’s small pack containing a few scraps of Clothes, some Letters, a few personal items such as a Horn Comb, and several Books, when my Assistant, John Bridgens, said, Might I have a few of those things, Dr. Goodsir?
I was surprised. Bridgens was indicating the Comb and a thick Leather Notebook.
I had looked into the Notebook already. Peglar had written in a crude sort of Code – spelling words in Reverse, Capitalizing the last letter of the last word in each Sentence as if it were the first – but while the Summary of the last Year of our Expedition might have held some Interest for a Relative, Both the foretop captain’s handwriting and sentence Structure, not to mention his spelling, had grown more Laboured and Crude in the Months immediately before and after our Abandoning of the Ships until it had all but disintegrated. One entry read, O Death whare is thy sting, the grave at Comfort Cove for who has any doubt how … [an illegible line here where the book had been Damaged by water]… the dyer sad…
On the back side of that sheet, I had noticed where Peglar had drawn a shaky circle and in that circle had written, the terror camp clear. The date had been illegible, but it must have been around 25 April. Another page nearby included such fragments as Has we have got some very hard ground to heave… we shall want some grog to wet houer… issel… all my art Tom for I do think… time… I cloze should lay and… the 21st night a gread.