The latter part of their passage under the ice had been very hazardous.

Had they struck a sharp rock below them, or had they been pierced by a jagged mass of ice above them, there probably would have been a speedy end of the expedition; and now, having come safely out of that dangerous shallow water, they shrank from going into it again.
It was the general opinion that if they would sail a considerable distance to the eastward they could not fail to find a deep channel by which the waters of this sea communicated with Baffin's Bay; but in this case they would be obliged to leave the line of longitude by which they had safely travelled from Cape Tariff to the pole and seek another route southward, along some other line, which would end their journey they knew not where.
"I am cold," said Sarah Block.

"At first I got along all right, with all these furs, and goin' down-stairs every time I felt chilly, but the freezin' air is beginnin' to go into my very bones like needles; and if winter is comin' on, and it's goin' to be worse than this, New Jersey is the place for me.

But there's one thing that chills my blood clammier than even the cold weather, and that is the thought of that whale follerin' us.

If we get down into those shaller places under the ice an' he takes it into his head to come along, he'll be worse than a bull in a china-shop.