VOYAGE TO SPITZBERGEX. 105 



From June 1st to June 7th, the weather was, 

 upon the whole pretty good, though the squalls 

 were very frequent, accompanied by dense showers 

 of snow. The rigging, by this time, had assumed 

 a very strange appearance, at least what would 

 be deemed as such by a more southern sailor. 

 The ropes were frequently increased to double 

 their usual size by the incrustations of ice, which 

 had to be beat off by handspikes to allow them to 

 pass through the blocks. The decks were every now 

 and then besprinkled with saw-dust and sand, to 

 counteract the slippiness arising from the combined 

 effects of frost and grease. The cabin-floor, too, 

 was covered with saw-dust, and the crew kept some 

 of it in their pockets to clean their hands. In this 

 space of time we catched five fish of different mag- 

 nitudes. 



During the time we were in those high lati- 

 tudes, our compasses, five in number, varied widely 

 from each other; but this is known to happen to all 

 compasses, according as they are placed in different 

 parts of the ship. That which was kept in the ca- 

 bin varied the least. This may perhaps tend to 

 confirm the opinion of some navigators, who have 

 maintained that the polarity of the needle is injured 

 by intense cold. The notion of the variation de- 



