358 THE VOYAGE OF THE JEANNETTE. 



The caqoenters have been engaged m making long 

 runners for the keels of our large boats, m case we 

 have to drag them over the ice in any mishap, while 

 work still progresses on the small boiler tube-pump. 



May ISth, Tuesday. — I went out this afternoon ac- 

 companied by Melville and Dunbar with a dog team, 

 and striking the young ice about two miles N. E. of the 

 ship, followed it to the westward as it ran for some three 

 miles. I could have gone further, and would have done 

 so but for my desire to get back in time for my sights 

 at 5.30. As a specimen of Arctic scenery, the ice we 

 met was very fine. The young ice covered an opening 

 which was about two hundred yards in width, and in 

 places five hundred yards. Towards the centre and 

 along it ran a crack here and there, widening to a foot. 

 Occasionally pools and lanes were met, the rippling of 

 the water being a sight pleasing to the eyes after our 

 long look at its frozen condition. On each side of this 

 long avenue the pack of old ice stood piled up in ir- 

 regular masses twenty and thirty feet in height, where 

 great pressures had occurred. (A month ago there was 

 no opening.) The thickest single floeberg I saw was 

 not more than eight feet — other pieces twelve and 

 fifteen feet in thickness, showing, upon examination, 

 lines of strata where one had overridden the other. To 

 the southward of the avenue, beyond the wall of ruins 

 lining its edge, we could see a long plain several miles 

 in extent, seemingly smooth ice, but as Mr. Dunbar had 

 previously attempted to get to the ship by crossing it, 

 he knew that it abounded in traps and pit-falls, where 

 one would unexpectedly flounder and sink to his arm- 

 pits. To the northward the ice was of the same hilly 

 and broken character as the wall, and I am convinced 

 that a sled could no more be dragged any considerable 



