The bumping continued and from the bridge we heard orders called in language which might have been couched in more parliamentary form. A noise like a storm issued from the engine room; they were trying at all costs to get the engines to work. We scrambled into our clothes and went up on deck, where we saw immediately the cause of the uproar, and the reason why the Captain was shouting out hoarse orders, while he still stood with his trousers in his hand. “Hobby” was lying “far in,” amongst the drift ice, and it was necessary to get out of it as quickly as possible, otherwise we might stick there for a much longer period than we should care to do. We also saw at a glance the cause of the bumping. A tremendous block of ice which lay close to the “Hobby” had a long projection under water--of such large dimensions that it stretched right under the vessel, and was visible at the other side knocking against an ice-floe which was crushing in on the side of the boat. Every time the floe heaved it struck the projection and drove it against the ship. The situation was not one of imminent danger, but it could become so at any moment, and we longed to hear the throbbing sound which would tell us the engines had started.... At last our wish was gratified and a start was made. Gently and carefully “Hobby” glided over the “ice-projection” which, by way of a farewell greeting as we got free of it, gave us a heavy double bump. We heaved a sigh of relief all round and the captain at last had leisure to put on his trousers. We were not right out of our trouble, however, as we had still 200–300 meters of ice to get through before we reached a clear water-course, but after a good deal of maneuvering we got through and steered eastwards. It seemed to us at first that the ice lay in a straight line to Ross Island (the most northerly of the Seven Islands), but after we patrolled its edge for an hour we found there was a large bay at the middle island and from the deck we could already see that the boundary between the loose “screw-ice” and the solid ice continued eastward to North Cape in Northeastland. It appeared as though the solid ice lay in a curve starting from a point within the bay and stretching northeast from Seven Islands, where we then lay.