184 PARRY'S POLAR VOYAGE. 



that direction. On the last of these days, however, a 

 breeze sprang up from the north, which opened, indeed, 

 a few lanes of water ; but this, it was feared, could not 

 compensate for the manner in which it must cause the 

 loosened masses of ice, with the travellers upon them, 

 to drift to the southward. This effect was soon found 

 to take place to an extent still more alarming than had 

 been at first anticipated ; for, instead of ten or twelve 

 miles, which they reckoned themselves to have achieved 

 northward on the 22d, they were found not to have 

 made quite four. This most discouraging fact was at 

 first concealed from the sailors, who only remarked that 

 they were very long in getting to the eighty-third degree. 



The expedition was now fast approaching the utmost 

 limits of animal life. During their long journey of the 

 22d, they only saw two seals, a fish, and a bird. On 

 the 24th only one solitary rotge was heard ; and it might 

 be presumed that, from thence to the pole, all would be 

 a uniform scene of silence and solitude. The adventur- 

 ers pushed on without hesitation beyond the realms of 

 life ; but now, after three days of bad travelling, when 

 their reckoning gave them ten or eleven miles of prog- 

 ress, observation showed them to be four miles south of 

 the position which they occupied on the evening of the 

 22d the drifting of the snow-fields having in that time 

 carried them fourteen miles backward. 



This was too much ; and to reach even the eighty- 

 third degree, though only twenty miles distant, was 

 now beyond all reasonable hope. To ask the men to 

 undergo such unparalleled toil and hardship, with the 

 danger of their means being exhausted, while an invisi- 

 ble power undid what their most strenuous labors 

 accomplished, was contrary to the views of their con- 

 siderate commander. In short, he determined that they 

 should take a day of rest, and then set out on their 



