Shackleton.

“We had now had one hundred and eight hours of toil, tumbling, freezing, and soaking, with little or no sleep. I think Sir Ernest, Wild, Greenstreet, and I could say that we had no sleep at all. Although it was sixteen months since we had been in a rough sea, only four men were actually seasick, but several others were off color.”

— Frank Worsley

“early discovered that I had no-one… except Shackleton who could be trusted at the tiller, and he was fully occupied by the general supervision of the fleet. I was at the tiller the whole time we were moving.

“About 3am, Shackleton was attending to one of the semi-conscious men and asked me some question. Peering ahead through my sore and bloodshot eyes, I had just at that moment caught a glimpse of a moonlit glacier on Elephant Island, and instead of replying to the question I said as plainly as I was able with swollen and aching tongue and throat, “I can see it! I can see it!” By the time Shackleton turned the island was obscured and he afterwards told me he had a momentary dread that ‘poor old Wild’s gone off his head.’”

— Frank Wild

“…both [islands] exactly on the bearings I had said they would be; and Sir Ernest congratulates me on the accuracy of my navigation under circumstances of some difficulty and after 2 days of Dead Reckoning, while working in and out amongst pack ice with no very accurate means of taking Compass courses & lying to for 2 nights at the mercy of the winds and currents.”

— Frank Worsley

“It was for me, and I expect for all of us, an unforgettable day – the wind torn cloudy sky, great banks of cumulus with shafts of sunlight breaking through, the vast ocean with curling white horses… the Caird leaping away ahead, and behind us the gallant little Wills at one moment outlined against the sky on the top of a crest, and the next falling into the trough so that we could only see the top of her mast.”

– Alexander Macklin

Rime of the Ancient Mariner
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

[…]

Four

‘I fear thee, ancient Mariner!
I fear thy skinny hand!
And thou art long, and lank, and brown,
As is the ribbed sea-sand.

I fear thee and thy glittering eye,
And thy skinny hand, so brown.’–
Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-Guest!
This body dropt not down.

Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.

The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I.

I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay

I looked to Heaven, and tried to pray;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.

I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky
Lay like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.

The cold sweat melted from their limbs,
Nor rot nor reek did they:
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.

An orphan’s curse would drag to hell
A spirit from on high;
But oh! more horrible than that
Is the curse in a dead man’s eye!
Seven days, seven nights saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.

The moving Moon went up the sky,
And no where did abide:
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside–

Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;
But where the ship’s huge shadow lay,
The charm’ed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.

Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:
They moved in tracks of shining white
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.

Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
Then coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.

O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

[…]