UNDER ^THE MIDNIGHT SUN. 353 



end, and then striking to N. W. had some very heavy 

 traveling until we struck a long lead of young ice, ex- 

 tending N. E. about three miles, where it ended at very 

 old and very heavy ice. Leaving this we doubled back 

 S. W. to the ship. One has need only to make such 

 an excursion to be satisfied of the still greater perils 

 we have escaped than those which we have endured. 

 Where some of these floe edges have met and fought, 

 rearing themselves fifteen and twenty feet in the air, 

 no ship could survive. 



Excellent observations to-day place us in latitude 

 73° 13' r N., longitude 178° 52' 45" E., showing a drift 

 since yesterday of three and three quarter miles to N. 

 7° W. Besides being satisfactory as indicating progress, 

 of some kind, it is worthy of note as being the highest 

 latitude yet attained on this side of the Arctic Ocean 

 (that is on the sea), Collinson's furthest being, I be- 

 lieve, 73° 11'. And yet no land. 



Sounded at noon in twenty-nine fathoms. Muddy 

 bottom, a rapid drift to N. being indicated by the lead 

 line. This is caused no doubt by a coming southerly 

 gale, for the wind to-day is S. E., with velocities from 

 eight to eleven miles, and there seems to be a gen- 

 erally unsettled look to the weather, which promises 

 wind. The ice seems not only to exert a deadening ef- 

 fect on winds when they reach us, but actually to retard 

 their advance. I venture to say we have never had 

 the severity of a storm within the pack that has pre- 

 vailed on its borders. Our highest anemometer veloc- 

 ity has been only forty miles, and it seems almost in- 

 credible that one should pass a winter in the Arctic 

 Ocean with nothing greater. 



May IQth, Sunday. — And again a bear. Mr. Dun- 

 bar went out with the natives this afternoon to visit 



23 



