Fast in the Ice : Adventures in the Polar Regions

The novel, Fast in the Ice written by R.M. Ballantyne has a story of much hearty cheer given as the brig left Old England for the Polar Seas.Many a tearful eye gazed that day as she steered her course into the unknown regions of the far north.But she was never welcomed back with a cheer, and no one ever looked up to see her sails heading toward land as they rose on the distant horizon.The captain of the brig Harvey was a tall, strong man, with short, curly black hair and stern black eyes.The narrator refers to Frome as "the yank of a chain" and depicts him as "the most stunning figure in Starkfield," "the ruin of a man," and with a "careless powerful look, in spite of a lameness stopping each movement." The narrator seeks to discover more about him out of curiosity.He learns that Frome's limp resulted from an injury sustained in a "smash-up" twenty-four years earlier, but further information is withheld.The narrator also learns little else from Frome's neighbors, aside from the fact th