Brown on Resolution by C.S. Forester — Read

Albert Brown had spent a weary night. Before morning he had used the last of his water, and his thirst occupied nearly all his thoughts. His hunger had led him to eat some of his tinned provisions, and that, of course, increased his thirst inordinately. From the cessation of the noise of the riveting on board Ziethen he deduced that repairs were completed, but as long as a landing party was on shore it was his duty to go on fighting and keep it occupied, and so detain Ziethen longer still at Resolution. He fought down his thirst, and he fell now and again into a troubled sleep, from which he awoke each time with a start and listened to the clamorous noises made in the otherwise still night by the landing party.

It is difficult to imagine the condition of the surface of Resolution. Think of a stretch of mud exposed to the sun. It cracks in all directions, breaking up into small cakes. The lava of Resolution has done the same thing; the pieces of lava of which it is composed are of much the same size and shape as a dining-room table would be if it were solid down to the end of its legs, and the cracks between the pieces vary in depth from one to ten feet. Now realize that the edges of each cake are sharp as knives, and that the surfaces of each cake are seamed with minor cracks whose edges are equally sharp. Add to this the facts that landslides and earthquake action have tumbled the blocks over each other higgledy-piggledy, and that the general slope of the whole mass is on one side steeper than the roof of a house and on the other nearly as steep. Finally, dot the whole slopes with intensely spiny cactus, and a faint mental picture can be formed of the difficulty of progress over them in the dark, especially when hampered by thirst on a hot night. A hundred yards in an hour is a high speed -- six hundred yards in six hours is impossible.