1778. THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 423 



time we had baffling light winds, but it soon fixed at 

 S., and increased to a fresh gale,with showers of rain. 

 We got the tack aboard, and stretched to the east- 

 ward ; this being the only direction in which the sea 

 was clear of ice. 



At four in the morning of the 27th, we tacked and 

 stood to the W., and at seven in the evening we were 

 close in with the edge of the ice, which lay E. N. E. 

 and W. S. W., as far each way as the eye could reach. 

 Having but little wind, I went with the boats to ex- 

 amine the state of the ice. I found it consisting of 

 loose pieces of various extent, and so close together, 

 that I could hardly enter the outer edge with a boat ; 

 and it was as impossible for the ships to enter it, as if 

 it had been so many rocks. I took particular notice 

 that it was all pure transparent ice, except the upper 

 surface, which was a little porous. It appeared to be 

 entirely composed of frozen snow, and to have been 

 all formed at sea. For setting aside the improbability, 

 or rather impossibility, of such huge masses floating 

 out of rivers, in which there is hardly water for a 

 boat, none of the productions of the land were 

 found incorporated or fixed in it ; which must have 

 unavoidably been the case, had it been formed in 

 rivers, either great or small. The pieces of ice that 

 formed the outer edge of the field, were from forty 

 to fifty yards in extent to four or five ; and I judged 

 that the larger pieces reached thirty feet or more 

 under the surface of the water. It also appeared to me 

 very improbable, that this ice could have been the pro- 

 duction of the preceding winter alone ; I should sup- 

 pose it rather to have been the production of a great 

 many winters. Nor was it less improbable, accord- 

 ing to my judgment, that the little that remained of 

 the summer could destroy the tenth part of what 

 now subsisted of this mass, for the sun had already 

 exerted upon it the full influence of his rays. In- 

 deed, I am of opinion that the sun contributes very 

 little toward reducing these great masses. For 



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