OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



7 



Lyon counted fifty-four in sight at one time. Some of these were of large 1821. 

 dimensions, their height above the sea being not less than two hundred ^jj^ 

 feet. In passing one of them, which was aground, at three P.M., Ave ob- 

 served the flood running past it to the W.S.W., at the rate of two or two 

 and a half knots. At six o'clock the ice became so close that we could no 

 longer make any progress, and the tide carrying us soon after towards a 

 large berg aground in ninety fathoms, while the drift ice threatened to 

 enclose us betwixt them, we ran under the lee of the berg and, by great 

 exertion in the boats, succeeded in getting a line fast to it. The eddies and 

 whirlpools, however, caused by the tide running at the rate of four or five 

 knots, rendered the ships perfectly unmanageable, and the ice closing round 

 us before a hawser could be run out, the line was soon snapped, and the ships 

 carried towards the land, the boats having with difficulty been got on board 

 and hoisted up. 



We lay closely beset, though drifting rapidly about with the tides, during Tues. 3. 

 the night ; and, early on the morning of the 3d, the ice gradually slack- 

 ing about us, we succeeded in getting into clear water, and continued our 

 progress without obstruction, at the distance of ten or twelve miles from 

 the land. Within this the ice was closely packed in one impenetrable body 

 the whole way to the shore, and the same to the southward and eastward, 

 leaving a navigable channel, four or five miles in breadth, leading towards 

 the entrance of Hudson's Strait. 



These favourable appearances, however, continued only till seven P.M., when 

 the ice opposed our further progress to the westward, covering the whole 

 sea as far as the eye could reach in that direction ; the ships were, there- 

 fore, of necessity hove to, in order to await some change in our favour. The 

 tide appeared to have been setting to the eastward from noon till six P.M. y 

 about which time it turned in the opposite direction, and, soon after we had 

 hove to, the ships were carried by it into the ice which formed their present 

 impediment, at the rate of more than three miles an hour, and were quickly 

 beset by other pieces of ice drifting in upon them from the eastward. The 

 ice here consisted principally of large, though loose, masses of broken floes, 

 none covering more than a quarter of an acre, and few so much, but 

 having many high hummocks, and drawing a great deal of water. We 

 counted also above thirty bergs in sight at one time, and observed that 

 many of them were carried about by the tides with great rapidity. 



At a quarter past midnight the westerly tide slackened ; and the ice, soon 



