244 OF THE EXPEDITION 



ice clears away, and leaves the sea open for vessels to sail 

 beyond the Frow Islands in the seventy-third degree, and 

 sometimes to the seventy-fourth degree, or, as the sailors 

 familiarly call it, the Devil's Thumb. In some seasons, 

 as in the last, ships can advance even further, as I have 

 noted in my Journal account — to the seventy-eighth degree 

 nearly, until the icy continent spreads its rocky front 

 against further advance that way to the Pole. 



Now, even were the project of sailing to the Pole a 

 practicable one, is it inferred that in event of such a thing 

 being done, the object of the present voyages would be 

 accomplished ? Allowing, for an instant, that a ship could 

 be brought to the extremity of latitude, until the curiosity of 

 the contriver of such a voj^age might be gratified with a 

 sight of probably the polar star in his zenith,* to what utility 

 could such a proceeding possibly lead? Suppose, at the same 

 time, for the latter supposition is, at least, as likely to be cor- 

 rect as the former, that there exists interminable ice, — such 

 a mass as the icy continent which I have seen at Davis's 

 Strait, what then, it may be asked, would be the proper 

 and safe mode of proceeding, but to return before the season 

 of fogs, frost, and storms should involve the incautious 

 mariner in inevitable destruction ? It is far from my dis- 

 position to treat a matter of such a serious nature with 



* It is not possible to sec the stars in high northern latitudes during the 

 summer. 



