350 APPENDIX. No. XVI. 



stood we heard about every half minute a noise varying 

 between the sharp crack of a whip and the report of a gun- 

 cap, resulting, as we soon discovered, from the formation of 

 thread-like cracks, many yards in length, which formed a 

 kind of network over the surface of the ice. 



The behaviour of the water in the wide fissures was very 

 puzzling. It seemed to rise and fall to a certain extent 

 through the ice, but not enough to account for the whole 

 tidal movement ; and we were therefore inclined to believe 

 that the glacier ice was only aground at certain periods of 

 the tide, and that it consequently behaved in some respects 

 like a floe, and in others like grounded ice. Not being- 

 provided with a sounding line, no estimate of the depth of 

 any part of the fiord was made. However, to solve the 

 question as to the existence of a vertical tidal movement in 

 the ice, Lieutenant Fulford took a series of sextant angles 

 between the summit of the cliff adjoining our camp and a 

 marked spot on the ice, and observing at different periods of 

 the tide, came to the conclusion that there was a certain 

 amount of vertical motion. 



Having failed to get up the fiord by the north-east side to 

 a greater distance than eighteen and a half miles from Offley 

 Island, Lieutenant Fulford decided on moving round by the 

 edge of the glacier ice to the opposite or south-west side, and on 

 trying there to discover a more practicable route than we had 

 hitherto encountered. In the latter attempt, however, we 

 were disappointed, for after travelling along the floe under 

 the south-west cliffs to a distance of thirteen miles from Cape 

 Lucie Marie, we found the glacier ice jammed right against 

 the face of the cliffs, and not affording anywhere a practicable 

 route for our sledge. Between the young floe and the glacier 

 ice was a well-marked tidal crack, which extended for three- 

 fourths of the way across the fiord, that is, as far as the young 

 floe and the glacier ice met without the intervention of an 

 old floe. 



On the 3rd of June we commenced our return journey, 

 and stopping for one day at Offley Island, had opportunities 



