Our lower masts
being short, and our yards very square, the sail had a head of
nearly fifty feet, and a short leach, made still shorter by the deep
reef which was in it, which brought the clew away out on the
quarters of the yard, and made a bunt nearly as square as the mizen
royal-yard. Beside this difficulty, the yard over which we lay was
cased with ice, the gaskets and rope of the foot and leach of the sail
as stiff and hard as a piece of suctionhose, and the sail itself about
as pliable as though it had been made of sheets of sheathing copper.
It blew a perfect hurricane, with alternate blasts of snow, hail,
and rain. We had to fist the sail with bare hands. No one could
trust himself to mittens, for if he slipped, he was a gone man. All
the boats were hoisted in on deck, and there was nothing to be lowered
for him. We had need of every finger God had given us. Several times
we got the sail upon the yard, but it blew away again before we
could secure it. It required men to lie over the yard to pass each
turn of the gaskets, and when they were passed, it was almost
impossible to knot them so that they would hold.
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