The journey undertaken on the morning of October 21, 1850, came near proving fatal to Captain M’Clure. On the return trip a week later about 2 P.M. one afternoon, having seen the Princess Royal Isles and knowing the position of the ship, he decided to leave his sledge and push ahead, that a warm meal might be made ready for the rest of the party upon their arrival at the ship. Night overtook him when still at least six miles from the vessel, and a dense mist, accompanied by heavy snow, obscured every object. “I now,” writes M’Clure, “climbed on a mass of squeezed-up ice, in the hope of seeing my party, should they pass near, or of attracting the attention of some one on board the vessel by firing my fowling-piece. Unfortunately, I had no other ammunition than what it was loaded with; for I had fancied, when I left the sledge, that two charges in the gun would be all I should be likely to require. After waiting for an hour patiently, I was rejoiced to see through the mist the glaring of a blue light, evidently burnt in the direction in which I had left the sledge. I immediately fired to denote my position; but my fire was unobserved, and, both barrels being discharged, I was unable to repeat the signal. My only hope now rested upon the ship’s answering, but nothing was to be seen; and, although I once more saw, at a greater distance, the glare of another blue light from the sledge, there seemed no probability of my having any other shelter for the night than what the floe afforded. Two hours elapsed; I endeavored to see the face of my pocket compass by the light of a solitary lucifer match, which happened to be in my pocket; but in this hope I was cruelly disappointed, for it fizzed and went out, leaving me in total darkness. It was now half-past eight; there were eleven hours of night before me, a temperature of 15° below zero, bears prowling about, and I with an unloaded gun in my hands. The sledge-party might, however, reach the ship, and, finding I had not arrived, search would be made, and help be sent; so I walked to and fro upon my hummock until, I suppose, it must have been eleven o’clock, when that hope fled likewise. Descending from the top of the slab of ice upon which I had clambered, I found under its lee a famous bed of soft, dry snow; and thoroughly tired out, I threw myself upon it and slept for perhaps three hours, when, upon opening my eyes, I fancied I saw the flash of a rocket. Jumping upon my feet, I found that the mist had cleared off, and that the stars and aurora borealis were shining in all the splendor of an Arctic night. Although unable to see the islands or the ship, I wandered about the ice in different directions until daylight, when, to my great mortification, I found I had passed the ship fully the distance of four miles.”