of reaching the North Pole. StQ 



turers, and no needle-like crystals to distress them, — then, I 

 should consider that the experiment would have every reason- 

 able chance of success. 



Besides, when the ice is in this continuous and favourable 

 state, the adventurous party might avail themselves of the use 

 of reindeer or dogs to drag their light sledges across the north- 

 ern fields or floes, which, besides affording them relaxation from 

 too arduous exertion, would yield a valuable reserve of nour- 

 ishment (however painful such an application of these useful 

 animals), either in case of resources failing them, or, what might 

 easily happen, any of the provisions being lost. 



But on the abatement of the frost, the change that takes place 

 is not less detrimental to the success of a superglacial journey, than 

 it is astonishing in itself. For every whale-fisher knows by hard- 

 bought experience, that the cementation of the drift-ice, which in 

 April and May presents so formidable an obstruction to the pro- 

 gress of a ship that it frequently costs him hours and days of 

 hard labour to advance a few fathoms, is in June or July so com- 

 pletely dissolved, that he can often sail through the very centre 

 of the same body of ice in any direction, without ever stopping ! * 

 And he is equally familiar with the fact, that the tendency of 

 the ice, which during the frost is to form into compact streams 

 and continuous bodies, and tenaciously to adhere as if by gene- 

 ral attraction, is so changed on the cessation of the frost, espe- 

 cially in July and August, that the adhesive tendency is quite re- 

 versed, and there now seems to be a universal repulsion ; so that 

 in places where there is space for it to separate, and when there 

 is no action of a swell to bring it together, no two pieces of ice 

 can be said to be in contact ! What a serious obstacle such a 

 change in the condition of the ice, as to continuity, must pre- 

 sent against the polar journey, will be evident, even to persons 

 who have never witnessed the fact, without a word of argument 

 or illustration ! 



It has been necessary to enter into these explanations, that 

 the Society may judge of the defects in the plan of the recent 

 expedition, which it is my object in this part of my communica- 

 tion to endeavour to point out, that no one may be obliged to 



• Account of the Arctic Regions, vol. i. 274-5. 



