910 A VOYAGE OF. DISCOVERY 
stone of a whitish colour, and generally of a slatey 
nature. 
Wednesday, 7th. — We packed up the tents and 
set off for the sea-side at a quarter before two 
o’clock this morning, and at twenty minutes after 
four pitched them again on the beach, under the 
shelter of some high hummocks of ice which were 
thrown up there. As the weather was inclement 
at the time, we did not begin to dig the hole 
through the ice until the afternoon. It fortunately, 
however, cleared up for a little while at noon, so 
that the meridian altitude of the sun was obtained, 
and, in the afternoon, sights were taken to deter- 
mine the longitude, and azimuths for finding the 
variation. The results of these observations were 
as follows, viz. lat. '75° 34’ 47” N., long. 12’ 18” E. 
of Winter Harbour, and the variation of the com- 
pass 134° 32’ 20” east. 
We had reason to consider ourselves very fortu- 
nate in having been able to determine these points 
in so short a time, and in so unfavourable weather. 
We were no less successful in cutting through the 
ice, for although we had no other instruments 
but the boarding pikes to dig with, we suc- 
ceeded in our labour by ten o’clock, P. M. Its 
thickness exceeded any floe-ice that we have seen 
in these regions before, being no less than four- 
teen feet four inches, and it likewise appeared to 
be of a firmer texture than usual, being as blue as 
any berg-ice, and equally as compact. ‘The water 
that rushed through it did not taste very salt ; it was 
sufficiently so, however, to distinguish it to be that 
