We had taken the ice, in the latter case, with the view of penetrating the barrier betwixt the free northern ocean and the fishing stations in the seventy-ninth and eightieth degree of latitude, along with a large fleet of other whalers. For some days, whilst no material progress could be made, we remained in varying relative positions presenting but little decided advantage. At length, when circumstances gave room for the due exercise of talent and perseverance, we made a progress so much beyond that of our associates, that we gradually left them, farther and farther, behind us, until the whole of the fleet were out of sight. We thus gained the “northern water” considerably before the others, and, falling in with whales in abundance, soon commenced a most encouraging fishery. By and by, others of the fleet began to make their appearance; and I well remember the astonishment of the captains and men of three ships which came close up to us on the 5th of June, just as we had taken in our _fourteenth_ whale, whilst they had only obtained six amongst them. One of these ships had been near us, or in company with us, on the 27th of May, the day on which we succeeded in surmounting the icy-barrier. She, however, had only made the same passage the day before this, and had made but trifling progress in the fishery. As there is no portion of the navigable ocean throughout the globe, at all comparable, as a field for the exercise of superior talent in seamanship, with the ice-encumbered regions around the poles; so my Father’s capabilities in this beautiful practical science, had, at once, the requisite scope for their abundant exercises, and their admirable triumphs. No matter what the species of manœuvre or operation might be, he was equally superior in all. In “making fast” to the ice in gales of wind—an operation of singular difficulty and ofttimes of no small risk,—the manner in which he brought up his ship to the nearest possible proximity with the place of the ice-anchor, afforded time and opportunity for getting out and attaching the mooring hawser, and then, with progressively reduced sails, eased the ship’s action on the rope till fairly brought up, head to wind,—was in the highest degree masterly and beautiful. Repetitions of trial, and failure on failure, with much useless toil and re-setting of sails, and, not unfrequently, with very hard blows against the ice, were matters of such perpetual experience among the inferior navigators engaged in the service, as to render the operations we have just attempted to illustrate, the more conspicuously admirable. SECTION II.—_Natural Science._ To my Father’s _natural science_, or original, almost intuitive, perception and application of scientific principles, I have already made repeated allusion. But this characteristic of originality, as well as superiority of mind, deserves, I think, more special consideration.