Chap. VIII. PARRY'S THIRD VOYAGE. 267 



capriciously it may be said, for it is never known to 

 what point they may be directed, can possibly 

 escape destruction, especially among straits and 

 narrow passages between islands. Suppose a person 

 of ordinary intellect should be told, as Captain 

 Parry will tell him, that during the time his ships 

 were made fast on the dangerous coast which has 

 been spoken of, " the ice was setting to the south- 

 ward, and sometimes at a rapid rate, full seven 

 days out of every ten," would not such a person 

 naturally ask, why was advantage not taken of such 

 an auxiliary when going in the right direction? 

 Captain Parry has replied to such a question. 



"On numerous occasions the ships might easily have 

 been placed among the ice, and left to drift with it, in com- 

 parative if not absolute security, where the holding them on 

 has been preferred, though attended with hourly and immi- 

 nent peril. This was precisely the case on the present 

 occasion ; the ships might certainly have been pushed into 

 the ice a day or two or even a week beforehand, and thus 

 preserved from all risk of being forced on shore ; but where 

 they would have been drifted, and where they would have 

 been again disengaged from the ice, or at liberty to take 

 advantage of the occasional openings in-shore (by which alone 

 the navigation of these seas is to be performed with any 

 degree of certainty), I believe it impossible for any one to 

 form the most distant idea." — p. 148. 



It will, perhaps, be considered indiscreet in a 

 landsman to question the opinion of one of such 

 great nautical skill and so well experienced in the 

 navigation of seas hampered with ice ; whose exer- 



