344 ANTARCTIC CRUISE. 



be strangers, being smaller ships than our own; at 4 h 30 m the Porpoise 

 hoisted her colours. Knowing that an English squadron under Captain 

 Ross was expected in these seas, Lieutenant-Commandant Ringgold 

 took them for his ships, and was, as he says, " preparing to cheer the 

 discoverer of the North Magnetic Pole." 



" At 4 b 50 m , being within a mile and a half, the strangers showed 

 French colours: the leeward and sternmost displayed a broad pen- 

 nant; concluded now that they must be the French discovery ships 

 under Captain D'Urville, on a similar service with ourselves : desirous 

 of speaking and exchanging the usual and customary compliments 

 incidental to naval life, I closed with the strangers, desiring to pass 

 within hail under the flag ship's stern. While gaining fast, and being 

 within musket-shot, my intentions too evident to excite a doubt, so far 

 from any reciprocity being evinced, I saw with surprise sail making 

 by boarding the main tack on board the flag-ship. Without a moment's 

 delay, I hauled down my colours and bore up on my course before the 

 wind." 



It is with regret that I mention the above transaction, and it cannot 

 but excite the surprise of all that such a cold repulse should have come 

 from a French commander, when the officers of that nation are usually 

 so distinguished for their politeness and attention. It was with no 

 small excitement I heard the report of it, — that the vessels of two 

 friendly powers, alike engaged upon an arduous and hazardous service, 

 in so remote a region, surrounded with every danger navigators could 

 be liable to, should meet and pass without even the exchange of 

 common civilities, and exhibit none of the kind feelings that the situa- 

 tion would naturally awaken: — how could the French commander 

 know that the brig was not in distress or in want of assistance 1 By 

 refusing to allow any communication with him, he not only committed 

 a wanton violation of all proper feeling, but a breach of the courtesy 

 due from one nation to another. It is difficult to imagine what could 

 have prompted him to such a course. 



At 6 p. m. the weather again was thick, with the wind southeasterly; 

 field-ice again in sight ; it commenced snowing and the French ships 

 were lost sight of. At 8 p. m., they passed in sight of large fields of 

 ice and ice-islands; at 10 h 30 m , the snow falling so dense and the 

 weather so thick, that it was impossible to see the brig's length in any 

 direction ; she was hove-to, to await a change of weather. 



The beginning of the 31st the gale continued; at 7 a. m. moderating, 

 they again made sail to the westward ; in half an hour discovered a 

 high barrier of ice to the northward, with ice-islands to the south- 

 ward; at 10 a.m., they found themselves in a great inlet formed by 



