164 ARCTIC VOYAGES. Chap. VI. 



An observation of Parry shows that the Arctic 

 climate, equally with our own, is influenced by a 

 change of the wind. Thus, on the 20th of October, 

 when the wind was N.N.W., the thermometer fell 

 to —10°; but veering to the S.E. on the 24th and 

 25th, it rose to + 23°. " I may possibly," he says, 

 " incur the charge of affectation in stating that this 

 temperature was much too high to be agreeable to 

 us ; but it is, nevertheless, the fact, that everybody 

 felt and complained of the change. This is ex- 

 plained by their clothing, bedding, fires, and other 

 precautions against the severity of the climate; 

 having been once adapted to a low degree of cold, 

 an increase of temperature renders them oppressive 

 and inconvenient. ,, Another circumstance is men- 

 tioned, which may serve to confirm a conjecture 

 which has long been maintained by some — that an 

 open sea, free of ice, exists at or near the pole. 

 " On the 2nd of November/' says Parry, " the wind, 

 freshened up to a gale from N. by W., lowered the 

 thermometer before midnight to — 5° ; whereas a 

 rise of wind at Melville Island was generally accom- 

 panied by a simultaneous rise in the thermometer 

 at low temperatures. " May not this," he asks, " be 

 occasioned by the wind blowing over an open sea 

 in the quarter from which the wind blows, and 

 tends to confirm the opinion that at or near the 

 Pole an open sea free of ice exists ? ' If the ice 

 which a single night of six months' continuous 



