Chap. IX. PARRY'S POLAR VOYAGE. 283 



James Clarke Ross, who has passed seven or eight 

 winters of his life in the ice, and has recently re- 

 turned from a three years' expedition into the Ant- 

 arctic Ocean — when these several cases are promi- 

 nently brought before us, the only conclusion to be 

 arrived at is this — that tne desire for ^distinction, 

 and the confident hope they shall merit it by some 

 new discovery, overpower every apprehension of 

 danger or difficulty, satisfied they possess resources 

 within themselves, and a sufficient stock of moral 

 courage to struggle against and to conquer both 

 difficulty and danger. There is also something 

 inviting to a seaman's mind to explore new coun- 

 tries, and not the less relishing by the access to 

 them being beset with obstacles, which to over- 

 come must sometimes require extreme suffering, 

 and even the sacrifice of life. 



The enterprise about to be described had plenty 

 of novelty, difficulty, and danger to recommend it ; 

 but Parry was not a man to rush headlong into a 

 novel and perilous scheme without making inquiry 

 into its nature. On consulting Phipps's voyage of 

 1773, he finds Capt. Lutwidge describing the ice 

 for ten or twelve leagues as u one continued plain 

 of smooth unbroken ice, bounded only by the 

 horizon." Mr. Scoresby's account was stronger 

 still. " I once saw," he says, " a field that was so 

 free from either fissure or hummock, that I ima- 

 gine, had it been free from snow, a coach might 



