100 WIND VEERS TO SOUTH-WEST. 



and heaped together, were not yet rivetted by the 

 continually increasing severity of the night-frosts. 

 Half of the month had now slipped away, 

 and we were held still within sight of the same 

 land as it were in the grasp of a giant. Yet 

 the prospect though unpromising enough was 

 not yet hopeless ; for about midnight the wind 

 drew round to the south-west, and came with a 

 force which, a week before, would have fulfilled 

 our most sanguine desires. The ice now, however, 

 was too close wedged to yield at once to its 

 influence, though considerably loosened. Up to 

 noon of Sept. 16. no effectual alteration took 

 place : the thermometer had once fallen as low 

 as 15° + , though it had now risen again to 31° + * 

 The height of the land made our distance from 

 shore appear less than it really w T as ; and often a 

 proposition was made to me that a small party 

 should endeavour to make their way across the 

 land to the westward, and satisfy themselves if 

 any open water was to be expected in that direc- 

 tion. However, being myself pretty confident 

 that there was open water, and moreover not 

 very far away, I could not at this crisis give my 

 consent to it. Besides the toil and difficulty 

 which must necessarily be encountered in the 

 attempt to traverse the country along the coast, 

 broken as it was into ravines and vallies, ren- 

 dered more impassable by the snow lately fallen ; 



