“I shipped wi’ Skipper Isra’l Gooden, from Carbonear:  the schooner was the Baccaloue, wi’ forty men, all told.  ’T was of a Sunday morn’n ’e ‘ould sail, twel’th day o’ March, wi’ another schooner in company,—­the Sparrow.  There was a many of us wasn’ too good, but we thowt wrong of ’e’s takun the Lord’s Day to ’e’sself.—­Wull, Sir, afore I comed ’ome, I was in a great desert country, an’ floated on sea wi’ a monstrous great raft that no man never made, creakun an’ crashun an’ groanun an’ tumblun an’ wastun an’ goun to pieces, an’ no man on her but me, an’ full o’ livun things,—­dreadful!

“About a five hours out, ‘t was, we first sid the blink,[D] an’ comed up wi’ th’ Ice about off Cape Bonavis’.  We fell in wi’ it south, an’ worked up nothe along:  but we didn’ see swiles for two or three days yet; on’y we was workun along; pokun the cakes of ice away, an’ haulun through wi’ main strength sometimes, holdun on wi’ bights o’ ropes out o’ the bow; an’ more times, agen, in clear water:  sometimes mist all round us, ’ee couldn’ see the ship’s len’th, sca’ce; an’ more times snow, jes’ so thick; an’ then a gale o’ wind, mubbe, would a’most blow all the spars out of her, seemunly.

    [Footnote D:  A dull glare on the horizon, from the immense
    masses of ice.]

“We kep’ sight o’ th’ other schooner, most-partly; an’ when we didn’ keep it, we’d get it agen.  So one night ’t was a beautiful moonlight night:  I think I never sid a moon so bright as that moon was; an’ such lovely sights a body ‘ouldn’ think could be!  Little islands, an’ bigger, agen, there was, on every hand, shinun so bright, wi’ great, awful-lookun shadows! an’ then the sea all black, between!  They did look so beautiful as ef a body could go an’ bide on ’em, in a manner; an’ the sky was jes’ so blue, an’ the stars all shinun out, an’ the moon all so bright!  I never looked upon the like.  An’ so I stood in the bows; an’ I don’ know ef I thowt o’ God first, but I was thinkun o’ my girl that I was troth-plight wi’ then, an’ a many things, when all of a sudden we comed upon the hardest ice we’d a-had; an’ into it; an’ then, wi’ pokun an’ haulun, workun along.  An’ there was a cry goed up,—­like the cry of a babby, ‘t was, an’ I thowt mubbe ‘t was a somethun had got upon one o’ they islands; but I said, agen, ‘How could it?’ an’ one John Harris said ’e thowt ’t was a bird.  Then another man (Moffis ’e’s name was) started off wi’ what they calls a gaff, (’t is somethun like a short boat-hook,) over the bows, an’ run; an’ we sid un strike, an’ strike, an’ we hard it go wump! wump! an’ the cry goun up so tarrible feelun, seemed as ef ’e was murderun some poor wild Inden child ’e’d a-found, (on’y mubbe ’e wouldn’ do so bad as that:  but there’ve a-been tarrible bloody, cruel work wi’ Indens in my time,) an’ then ‘e comed back wi’ a white-coat[E] over ‘e’s shoulder; an’ the poor thing wasn’ dead, but cried an’ soughed like any poor little babby.”