A year and three months had passed since the starting of the expedition, and still the little brig was fast in the ice. The men were, as Kane calls it, “scurvy riddled” and utterly prostrated, their supplies were rapidly becoming exhausted, and Kane determined to hold a council of both officers and crew. At noon of August 26th all hands were called, and the situation fully explained to them, the doctor, however, counselling them to stay by the brig, although he gave them full permission to make any attempt at escape they might deem feasible. Eight out of seventeen resolved to stand by the vessel. Dr. Hayes and eight others determined to make an effort to reach the settlements. Kane divided their remaining resources, and they left on the 28th. One of them, George Riley, returned a few days afterwards, and, three and a half months later, the rest were only too glad to rejoin the vessel, after enduring many sufferings. On December 12th, says Kane, “Brooks awoke me with the cry of ‘Esquimaux again!’ I dressed hastily, and groping my way over the pile of boxes that leads up from the hold to the darkness above, made out a group of human figures, masked by the hooded jumpers of the natives. They stopped at the gangway, and, as I was about to challenge, one of them sprang forward and grasped my hand. It was Dr. Hayes. A few words, dictated by suffering, certainly not by any anxiety as to his reception, and at his bidding the whole party came upon deck. Poor fellows! I could only grasp their hands, and give them a brother’s welcome.” The thermometer stood at -50° (82° below freezing); they were covered with rime and snow, and were fainting with hunger. It was necessary to use caution in taking them in to the warm cabin, or it would have prostrated them completely. “Poor fellows,” says Kane, “as they threw open their Esquimaux garments by the stove, how they relished the scanty luxuries which we had to offer them! The coffee and the meat biscuit soup, and the molasses and the wheat bread, even the salt pork which our scurvy forbade the rest of us to touch—how they relished it all! For more than two months they had lived on frozen seal and walrus meat.” They were all in danger of collapse, and had long to be nursed very carefully. Dr. Hayes was much prostrated, and three of his frost-bitten toes had to suffer amputation.