he was indifferent to everything in Pym's narrative that
did not relate directly to the castaways of Tsalal Island: his mind
was solely and constantly set upon their rescue.

According to the narrative of Arthur Pym _Jane_ experienced serious
difficulties, due to bad weather, from the 1st to the 4th of
January, 1828. It was not until the morning of the 5th, in latitude
23 deg. 15' that she found a free passage through the last iceberg
that barred her way. The final difference between our position and
the _Jane_ in a parallel ease, was that the _Jane_ took fifteen days to
accomplish the distance of ten degrees, or six hundred miles, which
separated her on the 5th of January from Tsalal Island, while on the
19th of December the _Halbrane_ was only about seven degrees, or four
hundred miles, off the island. Bennet Islet, where Captain Guy
intended to put in for twenty-four hours, was fifty miles nearer.
Our voyage was progressing under prosperous conditions; we were no
longer visited by sudden hail and snow storms, or those rapid falls
of temperature which tried the crew of the _Jane_ so sorely. A few
ice-floes drifted by us, occasionally peopled, as tourists throng a
pleasure yacht, by penguins, and also by dusky seals, lying flat
upon the white surfaces like enormous leeches. Above this strange
flotilla we traced the incessant flight of petrels, pigeons, black
puffins, divers, grebe, sterns, cormorants, and the sooty-black
albatross of the high latitudes. Huge medusas, exquisitely tinted,
floated on the water like spread parasols. Among the denizens of the
deep, captured by the crew of the schooner with line and net, I
noted more particularly a sort of giant John Dory (1) (_dorade_) three
feet in length, with firm and savoury flesh.

During the night, or rather what ought to have been the night of the
19th-20th, my sleep was disturbed by a strange dream. Yes! there
could be no doubt but that it was only a dream! Nevertheless, I
think it well to record it here, because it is an additional
testimony to the haunting influence under which my brain was
beginning to labour.

I was sleeping--at two hours after midnight--and was awakened by a
plaintive and continuous murmuring sound. I opened--or I imagined I
opened my eyes. My cabin was in profound darkness. The murmur began
again; I listened, and it seemed to me that a voice--a voice which
I did not know--whispered these words:--

"Pym . . . Pym . . . poor Pym!"

Eviden