ered with fragments of
ice. How the liberation of the ship had come about neither Sweers nor
I did then pause to consider. We were sailors, and our first business
was to act as sailors, and as quickly as might be we loosed and
hoisted the jib and foretopmast staysail, so that the vessel might
blow away from the neighbourhood of the dangerous remains of her jail
of ice. We then sounded the well, and, finding no water, went to work
to loose the foresail and foretopsail, which canvas we made shift to
set with the aid of the capstan. I then lighted the binnacle lamp
whilst Sweers held the wheel; and having sounded the well afresh, to
make sure of the hull, we headed away to the eastwards, the wind being
about W.S.W.

Before the dawn broke we had run the ice out of sight. Sweers and I
managed, as I have no doubt, to arrive at the theory of the liberation
of the ship by comparing our sensations and experiences. There can be
no question that the berg had split in twain almost amidships. This
was the cause of the tremendous noise of thunder which I heard. The
splitting of the ice had hoisted the shelf or beach on which the
barque lay, and occasioned that sensation of flying into the air which
I had noticed. But the lifting of the beach of ice had also violently
and sharply sloped it, and the barque, freeing herself, had fled down
it broadside on, taking the water with a mighty souse and crash, then
rising buoyant, and lifting and falling upon the seas as we had both
of us felt her do.

And now to bring this queer yarn to a close, for I have no space to
dwell upon our thankfulness and our proceedings until we obtained the
help we stood in need of. We managed to handle the barque without
assistance for three days, then fell in with an American ship bound to
Liverpool, who lent us three of her men, and within three weeks of the
date of our release from the iceberg we were in soundings in the Chops
of the Channel, and a few days later had safely brought the barque to
an anchor in the river Thames.

The adventure yielded Sweers and I a thousand pounds apiece as salvage
money, but we were kept waiting a long time before receiving our just
reward. It was necessary to communicate with the owners of the barque
in America, and then the lawyers got hold of the job, and I grew so
weary of interviews, so vexed and sickened by needless correspondence,
that I should have been thankful to have taken two hundred pounds for
my share merely t