Several ships being about us, there was a possibility that some person might attack and make a prize of the whale, when it had so far escaped us, that we no longer retained any hold of it; as such, we sat all the sail the ship could safely sustain, and worked through several narrow and intricate channels in the ice, in the direction I observed the fish had retreated. After a little time it was descried by the people in the boats, at a considerable distance to the eastward; a general chase immediately commenced, and within the space of an hour three harpoons were struck. We now imagined the fish was secure, but our expectations were premature. The whale resolutely pushed beneath a large floe that had been recently broken to pieces by the swell, and soon drew all the lines out of the second fast-boat; the officer of which, not being able to get any assistance, tied the end of his line to a hammock of ice, and broke it. Soon afterwards, the other two boats, still _fast_, were dragged against the broken floe, when one of the harpoons drew out. The lines of only one boat, therefore, remained fast to the fish, and this with six or eight lines out, was dragged forward into the shattered floe with astonishing force. Pieces of ice, each of which was sufficiently large to have answered the purpose of a mooring for a ship were wheeled about by the strength of the whale; and such was the tension and elasticity of the line, that whenever it slipped clear of any mass of ice, after turning it round, into the space between any two adjoining pieces, the boat and its crew flew forward through the crack, with the velocity of an arrow, and never failed to launch several feet upon the first mass of ice that it encountered. While we scoured the sea around the broken floe with the ship, and while the ice was attempted in vain by the boats, the whale continued to press forward in an easterly direction towards the sea. At length, when 14 lines (about 1680 fathoms) were drawn from the fourth fast-boat, a slight entanglement of the line, broke it at the stem. The fish then again made its escape, taking along with it a boat and 28 lines. The united length of the lines was 6720 yards, or upwards of 3-3/4 English miles; value, with the boat, above 150_l._ sterling. The obstruction of the sunken boat, to the progress of the fish, must have been immense; and that of the lines likewise considerable; the weight of lines alone, being 25 hundred weight.