158 PLEASANT WAYS IN SCIENCE. 



and he passed a hundred miles to the north of the 8oth 

 parallel, being impeded and finally stopped by the packed 

 ice around the north-western shores of Spitzbergen. 



Let us consider the fortunes of other attempts which 

 have been made to approach the Pole in this direction. 



In 1827 Captain (afterwards Sir Edward) Parry, who had 

 already four times passed beyond the Arctic Circle viz., in 

 1818, 1819, 1821-23, and 1824-25 made an attempt to 

 reach the North Pole by way of Spitzbergen. His plan was 

 to follow Hudson's route until stopped by ice ; then to leave 

 his ship, and cross the ice-field with sledges drawn by Esqui- 

 maux dogs, and, taking boats along with the party, to cross 

 whatever open water they might find. In this way he suc- 

 ceeded in reaching latitude 82 45' north, the highest ever 

 attained until Nares's expedition succeeded in crossing the 

 Syd parallel Parry found that the whole of the ice-field 

 over which his party were laboriously travelling northwards 

 was being carried bodily southwards, and that at length the 

 distance they were able to travel in a day was equalled by 

 the southerly daily drift of the ice-field, so that they made 

 no real progress. He gave up further contest, and returned 

 to his ship the Hecla. 



It is important to inquire whether the southerly drift 

 which stopped Parry was due to northerly winds or to a 

 southerly current ; and if to the latter cause, whether this 

 current probably affects the whole extent of the sea in which 

 Parry's ice-field was drifting. We know that his party were 

 exposed, during the greater part of their advance from Spitz- 

 bergen, to northerly winds. Now the real velocity of these 

 winds must have been greater than their apparent velocity, 

 because the ice-field was moving southwards. Had this not 

 been the case, or had the ice-field been suddenly stopped, 

 the wind would have seemed stronger ; precisely as it seems 

 stronger to passengers on board a sailing vessel when, after 

 being before the wind for a time, she is brought across the 

 wind The ice-field was clearly travelling before the wind, 

 but not nearly so fast as the wind ; and therefore there is 



