Edgar Allan Poe  The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket

«I felt my knees strike violently together, while my fingers were gradually but certainly relaxing their grasp. There was a ringing in my ears, and I said, “This is my knell of death!”»

Arthur Gordon Pym stows away on the whaling ship Grampus and experiences a series of misadventures at sea. Surviving a shipwreck, he is rescued by the crew of the ship Jane Guy, aboard which he sails toward the South Pole in search of unexplored lands.