They had, however, provisions enough to carry them all the way, with a good condensing machine on board, so that they had no intention of calling at any intermediate port; however, their forced guests declared themselves perfectly content with the arrangement. New York would suit them as well as any other port, for from there they could get across to England and the Continent. The doctor stated that he had friends in New York who would supply them with the needful funds, and the captain was quite satisfied with this statement.
They had a jovial enough time on board, as the ladies helped to vary the monotony. They had transferred their attentions from Dennis at his and the doctor's special commands, which fell in with their own fickle inclinations, to the mates and seamen. The captain having a wife at home to whom he had been attached for over a quarter of a century they left alone.
Captain Abraham Wheeler was a hardy old sea-dog of nearly sixty years of age, grizzled and stalwart; he was well accustomed to the ice-floes both of the north and south polar regions; a Yankee who liked to make good bargains, and was reckoned to be rather hard, as well as dogged and strict in his ideas of discipline at sea, but hearty in his notions of hospitality, and guileless as a child, despite his affectation of Yankee cuteness.
His mates and crew were all picked men with whom he had sailed many a voyage, and therefore he had cause to trust them. Besides this they all had an interest in the present venture and vessel, taking shares in the profits instead of wages.
It was a kind of commonwealth concern, which might well have appealed to the socialistic principles of these
