246 DESCRIPTION OF GREENLAND. 



and they caught plaice, trout, and salmon. Their fishing and 

 hunting fortified them, and the courage they took resolved 

 them upon attempting in the state they were in, if they could 

 pass through so much sea and through so much peril, to 

 arrive at Denmark. It began to be a little warmer now, and 

 it also rained a little ; whence there arose such a quantity of 

 gnats that they did not know where to go to get out of their 

 way. 



They left their large vessel and embarked in their frigate 

 on the sixteenth of July. They sailed from this port, where 

 I told you they had put their vessels under cover from the 

 ice, and which CajDtain Munck called after his own name, 

 Jens Munches Bay, which means the bay or port of John 

 Munck. He found the Christian Sea covered with floating 

 ice, and here he lost his sloop, and had great difficulty in 

 disengaging his own vessel ; for the rudder was broken, and 

 whilst waiting to have it repaired he fastened his vessel to a 

 rock of ice, Avhich followed the current of the sea. He freed 

 himself from this ice, which sank, and found his sloop again 

 ten days after having lost it. But he was not long thus, for 

 the sea became frozen again and melted soon after, and con- 

 tinued varying in this manner, freezing and thawing from 

 one day to another. He went through the end of Christian 

 Strait, came again to Cape Farewell, and re-entered the 

 ocean, where he was overtaken on the third of September by 

 a severe tempest, in which he was nearly lost ; for he and 

 his sailors were so weak that they were obliged to give up 

 all direction of the ship, and to siu'render themselves to the 

 mercy of the storm. The rigging of their sails was broken, 

 and the sails were overturned into the sea, whence they took 

 all possible pains to get them out. The storm abated for 

 some days, and gave them time to arrive on the 21st of Sep- 

 tember at a port of Norway, where they were anchored with 

 the end only of an anchor which was left them, and thought 

 they were safe. But the storm assailed them the very same 



