Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

Letter 4

August 5th, 17--

To Mrs. Saville, England

So strange an accident has happened to us that I cannot forbear

recording it, although it is very probable that you will see me before

these papers can come into your possession.

Last Monday (July 31st) we were nearly surrounded by ice, which closed

in the ship on all sides, scarcely leaving her the sea-room in which

she floated.  Our situation was somewhat dangerous, especially as we

were compassed round by a very thick fog.  We accordingly lay to,

hoping that some change would take place in the atmosphere and weather.

About two o'clock the mist cleared away, and we beheld, stretched out

in every direction, vast and irregular plains of ice, which seemed to

have no end.  Some of my comrades groaned, and my own mind began to

grow watchful with anxious thoughts, when a strange sight suddenly

attracted our attention and diverted our solicitude from our own

situation.  We perceived a low carriage, fixed on a sledge and drawn by

dogs, pass on towards the north, at the distance of half a mile; a

being which had the shape of a man, but apparently of gigantic stature,

sat in the sledge and guided the dogs.  We watched the rapid progress

of the traveller with our telescopes until he was lost among the

distant inequalities of the ice.  This appearance excited our

unqualified wonder.  We were, as we believed, many hundred miles from

any land; but this apparition seemed to denote that it was not, in

reality, so distant as we had supposed.  Shut in, however, by ice, it

was impossible to follow his track, which we had observed with the

greatest attention.  About two hours after this occurrence we heard the

ground sea, and before night the ice broke and freed our ship.  We,

however, lay to until the morning, fearing to encounter in the dark

those large loose masses which float about after the breaking up of the

ice.  I profited of this time to rest for a few hours.

In the morning, however, as soon as it was light, I went upon deck and

found all the sailors busy on one side of the vessel, apparently

talking to someone in the sea.  It was, in fact, a sledge, like that we

had seen before, which had drifted towards us in the night on a large

fragment of ice.  Only one dog remained alive; but there was a human

being within it whom the sailors were persuading to enter the vessel.

He was not, as the other traveller seemed to be, a savage inhabitant of

some undiscovered island, but a European.  When I appeared on deck the

master said, "Here is our captain, and he will not allow you to perish