he fires of the
sun like millions of little blazing stars. There were twenty different
dyes of light in the collection of spires, fanes, and pillars near the
schooner, whose masts, yards, and gear mingled their own particular
radiance with that of these dainty figures; and wherever I bent my gaze
I found so much of sun-tinctured loveliness, and the wild white graces
of ice-forms and the dazzle of snow-surfaces softening into an azure
gleaming in the far blue distances, that but for the piercing wind I
could have spent the whole morning in taking into my mind the marvellous
spirit of this ocean picture, forgetful of my melancholy condition in
the intoxication of this draught of free and spacious beauty.

Satisfied as to the state of the ice and the posture of the schooner,
viewed from without, I sent a slow and piercing gaze along the ocean
line, and then returned to the ship. The strong wind, the dance of the
sea, the grandeur of the great tract of whiteness, vitalized by the
flying of violet cloud-shadows along it, had fortified my spirits, and
being free (for a while) of all superstitious dread, I determined to
begin by exploring the forecastle and ascertaining if more bodies were
in the schooner than those two in the cabin and the giant form on deck.
I threw some coal on the fire, and placed an ox-tongue along with the
cheese and a lump of the frozen wine in a pannikin in the oven (for I
had a mind to taste the vessel's stores, and thought the tongue would
make an agreeable change), and then putting a candle into the lanthorn
walked very bravely to the forecastle and entered it.

I was prepared for the scene of confusion, but I must say it staggered
me afresh with something of the force of the first impression. Sailors'
chests lay open in all directions, and their contents covered the decks.
There was the clearest evidence here that the majority of the crew had
quitted the vessel in a violent hurry, turning out their boxes to cram
their money and jewellery into their pockets, and heedlessly flinging
down their own and the clothes which had fallen to their share. This I
had every right to suppose from the character of the muddle on the
floor; for, passing the light over a part of it, I witnessed a great
variety of attire of a kind which certainly no sailor in any age ever
went to sea with; not so fine perhaps as that which lay in the cabins,
but very good nevertheless, particularly the linen. I saw several wigs,
beav