102 THE SEA. 



gradually increases in age and thickness until it measures from 80 to 120 feet, floating 

 with its surface at the lowest part fifteen feet above the water-line. 



Strange as it may appear, the extraordinary thickness of the ice saved the ship from 

 being driven on shore, for, owing to its great depth of flotation, on nearing the shallow 

 beach it grounded, and formed a barrier, inside which the ship was comparatively safe. 

 When two pieces of ordinary ice are driven one against the other and the edges broken 

 up, the crushed pieces are raised by the pressure into a high, long, wall-like hedge of 

 ice. When two of the ancient floes of the Polar Sea meet, the intermediate, lighter, 

 broken-up ice which may happen to be floating about between them alone suffers ; it is 

 pressed up between the two closing masses to a great height, producing a chaotic wilder- 

 ness of angular blocks of all shapes and sizes, varying in height up to fifty feet above 

 water, and frequently covering an area of upwards of a mile in diameter. Captain Nares 

 mentions pieces being raised by outward pressure and crashing together which must have 

 weighed 30,000 tons ! A ship between such opposing masses would be annihilated in an 

 instant. 



As soon as the shore ice was sufficiently strong Commander A. H. Markham, with 

 Lieutenants A. A. C. Parr and W. H. May under his orders, started on the 25th 

 September with three sledges to establish a depot of provisions as far in advance to the 

 north-westward as possible. Lieutenant P. Aldrich left four days previously, with two 

 lightly-equipped dog-sledges, to pioneer the road round Cape Joseph Henry for the larger 

 party. He returned 'on board on the 5th of October, after an absence of thirteen days, 

 having, accompanied by Adam Ayles, on the 27th September, from the summit of a 

 mountain 2,000 feet high situated in latitude 82 48' North somewhat further north 

 than the most northern latitude attained by their gallant predecessor, Sir Edward Parry, 

 in his celebrated boat and sledge journey towards the North Pole discovered land extend- 

 ing to the north-westward for a distance of sixty miles to latitude 83 7', with lofty 

 mountains in the interior to the southward. 



On the llth October, two days after the sun had left them for its long winter's 

 absence, Commander Markham's party returned, after a journey of nineteen days, having 

 with very severe labour succeeded in placing a depot of provisions in latitude 82 44' 

 north, and of tracing the coast-line nearly two miles further north, thus reaching the 

 exact latitude attained by Sir Edward Parry. 



Being anxious to inform Captain Stephenson of his position, and the good prospects 

 before his travelling parties in the following spring in exploring the north-west coast of 

 Greenland, Captain Nares despatched Lieutenant Bawson to again attempt to open com- 

 munication between the two vessels, although he had grave doubts of his succeeding. 

 Rawson was absent from the 2nd to the 12th of October, returning unsuccessful 011 the 

 latter day, having found his road again stopped by unsafe ice within a distance of nine 

 miles of the ship. The broken masses of pressed up ice resting against the cliffs, in 

 many places more than thirty feet high, and the accumulated deep snow-drifts in the 

 valleys, caused very laborious and slow travelling. 



During these autumn sledging journeys, with the temperature ranging between 15 a 

 above to 22 9 below zero, the heavy labour, hardships, and discomforts inseparable from 



