44 NEW LAND. 



certainty ; in all probability it was the former, which had not yet 

 been broken up. 



We had a tearing current through the sound all that day, and 

 the ' Fram ' was by no means easy to steer. Often she swung 

 almost right round, and turned broadside on. By the end of the 

 middle watch we had reached the north end of Cardigan Strait, and 

 there fell in with a great deal of fast ice. Northward, as far as we 

 could see, the situation was the same. Then a thick fog suddenly 

 set in, and almost before we knew what was happening the ice had 

 closed in on us, and we lay nipped fast. The current, which had 

 slackened by degrees, was now running as swiftly northward as it 

 had previously done southward, and it was for this reason that the 

 ice had closed in so suddenly on our north. 



Here we lay fast until at the turn of the tide the ice slackened 

 again ; the fog also lifted a little, and we continued north-westward 

 with a fair view over the ice. We saw a very decided water- 

 sky in the north-west ; the atmosphere was extremely dark ; and 

 we hoped that it would not take us very long to make our way 

 into the open water it indicated. 



We soon discovered, however, that it was not going to be an 

 easy matter to reach our promised water northward. The ice was 

 very close as we went farther west, nor was there any particular 

 life in it. It consisted entirely of thin bay-ice. Mile by mile we 

 forged our way westward. We went very slowly, keeping all the 

 time three or four miles from land, but made some progress 

 nevertheless. Often we stuck fast in the ice, but as a rule got out 

 again in the course of an hour or two. 



We tried steering nearer land, and went into a bay on the 

 north side of Arthur Strait. But a little way up it we were 

 stopped by ice lying close in to land. In order to steer clear of 

 this we had to hold a course northward for a time, working our 

 way subsequently in the direction of Table Island. At one time 

 we were also hindered by thick fog ; but worse than this was a stiff 

 breeze which blew up from the north-west, and which by degrees 

 set the thin ice in such motion that it began to drift south-eastward 

 at the slightest puff of wind. 



We then tried keeping nearer land, where we saw a couple of 



