1876 ICE-FOOT. 1 ( > 1 » 



the land, become formed alongshore. When it was 

 nearly high-water, this gutterway becoming filled by 



the tide, cut off the ice-foot from the land. 



The absence of ice piled up above the ice-foot to 

 the westward of Cape Hayes was very remarkable. 

 Nowhere did we find it forced up by recent pressure 

 higher than three or four feet. This was totally differ- 

 ent from our experience of the preceding season, when, 

 at all the prominent points, we met with ice piled up 

 to a height of at least twenty feet. Its absence woidd 

 either denote a remarkably calm season, without any 

 winds blowing towards the shore, or indicate that the 

 pack consisted of heavy floes, which would become 

 stranded before they could reach the ice-foot. 



At 2 p.m. of the 6th the ice commenced setting out 

 of Airman Bay with the ebb-tide ; a channel near the 

 land also opening at the same time. Steam was ac- 

 cordingly raised, and after a little trouble in getting 

 clear of the young ice, which was now rather alarm- 

 ingly thick, we reached Cape Prescott ; but there we 

 were compelled to make fast, while the flood-tide was 

 running, to some bergs lying aground in twenty-nine 

 fathoms, a mile and-a-half from the shore. 



During the night and on the 7th the pack near 

 Norman Lockyer Island continued to open during both 

 the flood and the ebb tides ; but some young ice lying 

 between the ships and the Island, which would have 

 obliged us to use much coal in forcing our way through 

 it, induced me to wait until a decided water-channel 

 presented itself. By noon the ice had all cleared 

 away near the land, and we reached the neighbour- 

 hood of Walrus Shoal, and from thence discovered 



