A PERILOUS VOYAGE.

Mataura Ensign, Volume 6, Issue 343, 28 March 1884, Page 3

A PERILOUS VOYAGE.

A wonderful and exciting voyage of a small vessel engaged in the Labrador fish service has terminated far more satisfactorily than the Crew had anticipated. There is now lying in the St. Katherine's Docks, London, a small three-masted schooner-rigged steamship, of little more than 100 tons register, called the Diana, belonging, to the Hudson's Bay .Company, and which' has just " docked " ..from 'Ungav.ii. She is remarkable as being. tHe only vessel which has made the perilous' passage from Labrador through the ice and across ,the Atlantic during '83. She brought cargo of about thirty tons of fresh salmon, .not' packed in tins or cases, but the whole fish, simply cleaned at the gills, and preserved in a frozen state by what is known as the dry air process. The apparent smallness of, (he cargo is explained wjien it is understood that the space occupied by the refrige-. fator.and its machinery is considerable, that coals and stores -have to be carried for both the outward and homeward voyages, and that only small .vessels can be safely navigated in those' dangerous latitudes. Captain Riches, of rthe- Dpna, says that the misery of the voyage ,exceeded anything in hs Arctic experiences'. After leaving Ungava he passed through 240, "miles of immense, .masses of floating "iee 1 , many ; floes being two or ; three miles long and many feet: .thick, and being /nearly a.}\- the time, enveloped, in dense fog. He was T^'or 14 days in struggling through these o ! bstk6ie's,' J ,'ana) then had. to 'lay- to off Cape Farewell to wait for the sun, in order to -ascertain, his. position.. .So great was the ''danger to "be apprehended from these floating masses that jupon several.) occasions Captain Riches never left the bridge of his vessel for 48. 'hours;- not even- to take; hip meals, and after the Diana had been safely navigated through the ice he had . to be helped off the bridge, his prolonged fatigue and anxiety having so worn him out that he was unable to descend to his own cabin without assistance During the whole voyage from .Hudson's Bay of 37 days only two really fine, clear days were enjoyed from Labrador to tbe.Nore. .