226 ADVENTURES IN THE NORTHERN SEAS. 



Lord David, as I felt sure that he would have no 

 difficulty in filling his boat with venison. Not 

 caring about that description of sport myself, I 

 continued three or four miles farther on, to explore 

 a sort of narrow gut or sound into which the fiord 

 there contracts, in hopes of finding some floating 

 ice with seals, or maybe a bear. We found a 

 good deal of ice, but no seals ; and, on entering the 

 gut, there was such a tremendous current running 

 down it that, after persevering for two or three 

 miles more, we were obliged to stop. 



I stopped with great reluctance, as I was ex- 

 tremely anxious to ascertain whether this channel 

 really communicates with the East Sea or not 

 Many of the habitues of Spitzbergen believe that it 

 does, but the point has never been clearly settled, 

 as nobody has ever passed through the sound or 

 seen the termination of it. I then tried to continue 

 the exploration by walking up the sides of the 

 sound ; but the ground was so excessively rough as 

 to be almost impracticable for walking, and I had 

 to give it up. 



Christian had been sixteen seasons in Spitzber- 

 gen, but he had never been so far up as this before, 

 and could give me no information on the subject. 

 He, however, agreed with me in opinion that there 

 was strong evidence in favor of the communication 

 being complete, because the water seemed very deep, 

 and much heavy ice was floating down it ; also, he 

 thought the current was much stronger than was 



