A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 169 



to his vision. Bergs similar to islands, having bold and 

 precipitous fronts, sometimes crowned with eminences like 

 rocks or castles, and the summit of this seeming land sloping 

 gradually the opposite way, lie around embedded in the 



its former dense character : procellaria glacialis, colymbus modulans, 

 and sterna hirundo. 



June 13 : ther. 30°, 52°, 40° : wind, light and variable : the fog 

 having cleared away to the S.E. all the sky is clear: ship a short 

 distance from Fortune Bay : no ice to be seen, except a few bergs. 

 Just over Disko appeared a milk-white haze (illustrated in Plate 

 III.) forming rapidly into small light patches of cirrostratus in a 

 circular Une, out of which white radiations stretched through the 

 atmosphere, with visible motion, the centre of radiation lying in the 

 E. point, per compass. This radiation continued during the day, 

 extending over the whole upper sky, in fine lengthened ciiTous hairs 

 of the brightest whiteness. These latter towards evening gra- 

 dually assumed a greater elevation, exhibiting a beautiful display 

 of the varieties of that delicate cloud, the trains pointing to the S.W. 

 from which quarter others more faint issued, as if to meet the former. 

 Latterly a dead calm prevailed, and some appearance of the recurrence 

 of the fog ; procellaria glacialis sitting on the water all around, and 

 immense numbers of sterna hirundo on the wing: the cry of the 

 latter is a shrill screa-n. 



June 14 : ther. S4°, 46°, 32° : wind S.E., light air : fog, with light 

 minute snow drops : afternoon, a dead calm : a group of seals 



z 



