MAY, 1858. UXCERTAIXTY OF ICE-NAVIGATION. 97 



now, that, although I foiled, I believe my decision was 

 justified by all former experience, even independently of the 

 circumstances which obliged me to adopt it. Nevertheless 

 it is mortifying to find that ships had reached as far as 

 Pond's Bay, and with but little difficulty. Sir Edward 

 Parry, upon his third voyage, did not reach the west water 

 until very late in the season, although some of the whalers 

 met with better success by following up another route. 



There is nothing more uncertain than ice-navigation, de- 

 pendent as it is upon winds, temperatures, and currents : 

 one can only calculate upon " the chances," and how nearly 

 we succeeded we have already seen. In the preceding year 

 (1856) some of the whalers got through Melville Bay, as 

 early as the 15th June, only a few days after the commence- 

 ment of the summer's thaw. Captain Walker tells me there 

 are many years in which the whalers can pass up the western 

 shore late in the season, but not always so far as Pond's 

 Bay; of Melville Bay after the 10th or 15th July they know 

 nothing, but the voyages of discovery afford us ample de- 

 tails ; whilst of the southern route almost nothing has been 

 made publicly known. 



There are many intelligent whaling captains who possess 

 much valuable knowledge of these lands and seas, and even 

 in the terra incognita of Frobisher's Straits whalers have 

 wintered, whilst our charts scarcely afford even a vague idea 

 of the configuration of these extensive islands. The so- 

 called " Home Bay " has been penetrated for fifty miles and 

 is supposed to be a strait leading to Fox's Furthest. Scott's 

 Inlet is also said to be a strait leading into a western arm 

 of the same sea. A surveying vessel would be usefully 

 employed for a couple of summers in tracing the general 

 outline of these possessions of Her Majesty, more particu- 

 larly as they are rather thickly inhabited by Esquimaux most 

 eager to barter their produce for rifles, saws, files, knives, 



H 



