The Great Frozen Sea

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emand for steam, and the navigable season is also as rapidly waning, young ice forming alongside the ship nearly an inch in thickness. Patience, combined with caution and perseverance, is an indispensable qualification for an Arctic navigator. At the same time he mus

oon the ice began to move to the eastward, enabling us once more to make a start. Hastily shipping our rudders we got under weigh, and having bored through a few streams of ice emerged into a fine lead of water extending between the land and the pack. Passing Cape D'Urville, we opened a large inlet. At its head was a d

parently for miles into the interior, until lost amid the snow-shining mountains in the far distance. A large glacier at the head of the bay showed out prominently as it glistened in the light of a bright midnight sun, the bay itself being covered with an icy sheet, broken only by a few long low bergs, generated, in all probability, from the selfsame glacier. The few clouds that were visible i

E H

slands, were immediately commenced. A jolly-boat, obtained from the "Valorous," was also deposited here. We have now two large dep?ts,

ction at a much earlier date were palpable, the stones of which it was composed being covered with lichen, denoting great age. Hayes, in the published account of his voyage, makes no mention either of having seen this cairn or of having built one on the island. It was, undoubtedly, the work of white men's hands; the object and necessity for building cairns

ecord or clue by which its history might be ascertained; but nothing was found, and we were forced to content ourselves

, in order to "blast" a passage through the ice. The recent tracks of a bear were observed on the floe, being the only indications of the presence of

others they assumed a perfectly horizontal direction. This irregularity of the strata may probably be accounted for by the trap, or other primary rock, forcing its way upw

y should be docked, the requisite instructions were given, and in four hours the

tunate as to be placed between them with the whole force of the pack driving against the outer one. This operation is freq

for "all hands to cut dock" a most animated scene ensued. Triangles were quickly erected, saws placed in position, the dock measured and marked out by boarding-pikes placed at the several corners, and every one working as if their lives depended upon their own individual exertions. Three persons only w

ed that powder was used to shatter the larger pieces of ice that had been cut, but unless gr

ion. Ordinarily the work should be completed in about a couple of hours. When two or more ships are i

s. The last triangular piece of ice that is taken out-namely, the portion marked on the plan by the letters C B F-is r

ires had been allowed to burn out, and that we could neither get a cup of tea to refresh ourselves with, nor a chance of warming ourselves at the s

of ic

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o C 35 ft., and th

D 120 ft., and, if nece

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though Sunday was as much as possible observed as a day of rest, it was quite out of the question to a party situated as we were altogether to abstain from work on the Sabbath. Our navigable season, we knew, was a short one; no opportunity could we afford to lose; and therefore we were compelled to work as much on Sunday as on week-days should circumsta

NING OF

and it was therefore with no small amount of satisfaction, after a short detention, that we observed her again afloat. Our joy at being again on the move was short-lived. A few hours sufficed to bring us to the edge of a field of ice, to penetrate which seemed utterly impossible. To cut a dock in such ice, the floes being from ten to twenty feet in thickness, was also out of the question, even had we been provided with saws sufficiently long to do so. Blasting was resorted

unt Joy and Cape Hayes ascended; but always the same sc

berg that remained aground. It was an anxious time for us, for in five minutes, unless we could move out of the way, we must be inevitably crushed between the two. All hands were quickly summoned, a line laid out astern and made fast to some large hummocks, and by this we fortunately suc

en to; but still it was better than hearing our own timbers crashing to pieces in the

l times during each day, and, although this sort of work is rather depressing and irksome, the spirits of the crew never flagged. They were always ready, cheerful, and willing. No matter what duty they were called upon to perfo

nable us to proceed, and on that evening, to the intense

about four and a quarter miles a day. This cannot be considered a rapid rate of tr

it was studded with irregularities that, to an imaginative mind, might be perverted into gigantic beings, animals, or castellated towers. On one of these ridges was a heap of stones supposed to represent the "Twelve Apostles," and was so marked on the chart; but as we co

the "Polaris," relative to the meeting of two tides at or about this point. This fact materially strengthens the argument in favour of the insularity of Greenland, for it has been deduced from a series of tidal observatio

ting of these two tides: not more than would be caused by the fact of the channel decreasing in size to the northward at this point, and

e of the little bay in which we were secured, we obtained a

pe Constitution, with a large sheet of water along its base; but to get to it we should have had to penetrate a large expanse of pack. This pool of water was in all

fting ice, during the time we were on shore, which beset our boat. We were therefore compelled to haul and drag it over and through innume

ck this morning, being the top of

agined that game would be found in large quantities. A perfect cone-shaped hill on the north-west side is a very prominent feature of this bay. Indeed, the entire coast along which we are passing is composed of long ranges of hills more or less coniform, varying fr

closing floes. Although jammed for a short time, the pressure was not very great, and, the nip easing, the ship was released. Passing Cape Col

ur. The floe to which we were secured was kept stationary by a couple of grounded icebergs that effectually resisted all its eff

llinson, for the use of a travelling party which, according to existing arrangements, would be dispatched to the southward by the "Discovery"

ours' boring and working under steam and sail we were forced to relinquish the attempt, being unable to penetrate the pack in the direction we wished t

Thinking we should be able to reach some open water to the northward by the removal of the large floe to which we were fast, both ships' companies were employed in sawing off a large piece of it, which, impinging on one of the stranded icebergs, would, it was thought,

e eastward, and the captain, abandoning his former intention, determ

which, when reached, we found possessed no outlet. It was a perfect salt-water lake surrounded by ice. In this

tive seal is protruded out of the water, but immediately withdrawn (if not killed) on being saluted by half a dozen bullets from the rifles of our keen and enthusiastic sportsmen,

with lately were of great size, they were few in number. The one affordi

eadily to work at his ice-saw. Feeling, after a time, a little warm about his legs, he attributed it to his exertions in working the saw, until a sharp and intolerable pain caused