18-27. 



PACIFIC AND BEERING'S STRAIT. 313 



a few miles of the coast ; there the northerly current chap. 

 was more apparent. We first detected it off Schis- ^^^' 

 mareff Inlet ; it increased to between one and two Oct. 

 miles an hour off Cape Krusenstern, and arrived at its 

 maximum, three miles an hour, off point Hope : this 

 was with the flood tide ; the ebb ran W. S. W. half a 

 mile an hour. Here the current was turned off to 

 the north-west by the point, and very little was after- 

 wards felt to the northward. The point is bold and 

 shingly, and shows every indication of the current 

 being prevalent and rapid. 



This current, as I have before remarked, was con- 

 fined nearly to the surface and within a few miles of 

 the land ; at the depth of nine feet its velocity was 

 evidently diminished, and at three and five fathoms 

 there was none. The upper stratum, it should be 

 observed, was much fresher than sea water; and there 

 is no doubt that this current was greatly accelerated, if 

 not wholly occasioned, by rivers ; but why it took a 

 northerly course is a question I am not prepared to 

 answer. 



To the northward and eastward of Cape Lisburn 

 we found little or no current until we arrived at Icy 

 Cape. Off this projection it ran strong, but in oppo- 

 site directions, and seemed to be influenced entirely 

 by the winds. Near Point Barrow, with a south- 

 westerly gale, it ran at the rate of three miles an hour 

 and upwards to the N. E., and did not subside imme- 

 diately with the wind ; but the current must here have 

 been increased by the channel between the land and 

 the ice becoming momentarily narrowed by the pack 

 closing the beach ; and it must not be imagined that 

 the whole body of water in the Polar Sea was going at 

 the rapid rate above mentioned, which would be con- 



