302 VOYAGE TO THE POLAR SEA. April 



Henry and helped him for a short distance beyond. 

 The appearance of the ice within some six miles of the 

 cape was anything but cheering to the northern party, 

 but they hoped that as they got farther from the land 

 the floes would be larger and less broken up and the 

 hedges of hummocks narrower. The ice near the land 

 afforded such a bad travelling road that Aldrich had 

 determined to cross the land to the southward of the 

 cape. With the exception of one marine (who, it ap- 

 pears, was invalided from the Gold Coast), all the men 

 were well and in the highest spirits. The cold weather 

 had tried them much, and there had been several cases 

 of frost-bite, which but for the presence of Doctor 

 Moss might have become serious. Both Markham 

 and Parr had suffered from snow-blindness, but had 

 recovered by changing the hours of travelling from 

 day to night. Only one hare had been shot, but the 

 track of a wolf was noticed at Cape Joseph Henry. 

 The mid-day tea was very highly spoken of; both 

 officers and men were unanimous in favour of the 

 change, and willingly put up with the misery of stand- 

 ing still with cold feet during the long halt needed for 

 the purpose of boiling the water ; and all agreed that 

 they worked better after the tea and lunch than 

 during the forenoon. 



' As usual, the appetites of most of the travellers 

 had been bad for the first two or three days, but all 

 were recovered before Doctor Moss left them. 



' 16^. — Lieutenant Beaumont and Doctor Cop- 

 pinger, with two sledges and fourteen men, arrived from 

 the " Discovery " in excellent health and spirits after a 

 ten days' journey. A light breeze which we experi- 



