28 ARCTIC VOYAGES. Chap. II. 



In proceeding northerly the expedition came up 

 with several groups of whalers that had passed 

 through the floes of ice, in one of which it was 

 also shortly after beset, in latitude 75° 35', " the 

 Dexterity whaler now alone continuing in sight." 

 Yet, in the same page, Ross says, " We are 

 now arrived at a point between which and Cape 

 Dudley Digges, land had not been seen by former 

 navigators;" as if whale-fishers were excluded 

 from the class of navigators. He then goes on to 

 say that "between latitude 75° 12' and 76° the 

 shore formed a capacious bay, in the midst of which 

 rose a remarkable spiral rock ; this I named Mel- 

 ville's Monument, in grateful remembrance of the 

 late Viscount, from whom I received my first com- 

 mission. To the bay itself I gave the name of 

 Melville's Bay, from respect to the present First 

 Lord of the Admiralty. It is situated between 

 75° 12' and 76°, and abounds with whales, many of 

 which were taken by the ships that were persevering- 

 enough to follow us." 



And no doubt numbers of whalers, for ages be- 

 fore this, had persevered in their search of whales 

 far beyond the latitude of 76° ; but the expedition 

 being one for the purpose of discovery, something 

 new, it would seem, was to be struck out at this 

 early period, while on the Greenland side of Baffin's 

 Bay — a coast which could afford nothing connected 

 with the Polar Sea or with the north-west passage. 



