CHAP.VI.] SET OF CURRENT. 377 



marks on the stern-post that the entire mass, 

 composing that part of the floe, had risen three 

 inches. In the forenoon the ship was set to the 

 eastward, and had certainly drawn nearer to the 

 land, especially the eastern end of Charles Island, 

 which was not more than five or six miles away. 

 The other land, appearing at first continuous 

 with the latter island, was now ascertained to be 

 the dark and forbidding coast of Labrador. 



It is worth mentioning that even in calms we 

 were evidently set to the southward and east- 

 ward, but more particularly to the former, owing, 

 probably, to the set of the current through 

 Fox's Channel and between the islands, which 

 would strike somewhere on the main shore be- 

 foreyurning directly towards the Atlantic. There 

 was no other change during the night than 

 what was occasioned by the tides ; and on 

 June 25th, the weather was too overcast and 

 misty to allow our position to be ascertained. 

 At ll h 30 m soundings were struck in one hundred 

 and eighteen fathoms, and the bottom was com- 

 posed of mud and shells. It might be that the 

 heavier ice, by which, I mean that formed in the 

 winter, had drifted out of the Strait, as the 

 lighter pieces which now surrounded us seemed 

 to be the recent production of the spring, being 

 mostly even and of but a few feet thickness, 

 tinged with blue instead of the brownish green 



