bode, that he might be at hand to hasten the loading of the ship. The
operation, however, was somewhat slow, for it was necessary to overhaul
and inspect every pack to prevent imposition, and the peltries had then
to be conveyed in large boats, made of skins, to the ship, which was
some little distance from the shore, standing off and on.

One night, while Mr. Hunt was on shore, with some others of the crew,
there arose a terrible gale. When the day broke, the ship was not to be
seen. He watched for her with anxious eyes until night, but in vain. Day
after day of boisterous storms, and howling wintry weather, were passed
in watchfulness and solicitude. Nothing was to be seen but a dark and
angry sea, and a scowling northern sky; and at night he retired within
the jaws of the whale, and nestled disconsolately among seal skins.

At length, on the 13th of November, the Beaver made her appearance;
much the worse for the stormy conflicts which she had sustained in those
hyperborean seas. She had been obliged to carry a press of sail in heavy
gales to be able to hold her ground, and had consequently sustained
great damage in her canvas and rigging. Mr. Hunt lost no time in
hurrying the residue of the cargo on board of her; then, bidding adieu
to his seal-fishing friends, and his whalebone habitation, he put forth
once more to sea.

He was now for making the best of his way to Astoria, and fortunate
would it have been for the interests of that place, and the interests of
Mr. Astor, had he done so; but, unluckily, a perplexing question rose
in his mind. The sails and rigging of the Beaver had been much rent and
shattered in the late storm; would she be able to stand the hard gales
to be expected in making Columbia River at this season? Was it prudent,
also, at this boisterous time of the year to risk the valuable cargo
which she now had on board, by crossing and recrossing the dangerous
bar of that river? These doubts were probably suggested or enforced by
Captain Sowle, who, it has already been seen, was an over-cautious, or
rather, a timid seaman, and they may have had some weight with Mr. Hunt;
but there were other considerations, which more strongly swayed his
mind. The lateness of the season, and the unforeseen delays the ship
had encountered at New Archangel, and by being obliged to proceed to St.
Paul's, had put her so much back in her calculated time, that there was
a risk of her arriving so late at Canton, as to come