8 



SECOND VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 



1821. after, began to drift back in an E.N.E. direction at the same rate as before. 



■iv^ We remained beset the whole of this day, driving very near some bergs which 

 lay in our way, but unable to move the ships in any direction. We were, at 

 noon, in lat. 61° 13' 05", longitude by chronometers 64° 05' 10". The Avea- 

 ther being foggy, no land was in sight. Besides the above observations, some 

 were also obtained for the dip of the magnetic needle, which was 83° 58' 51", 

 and for the irregularities occasioned by local attraction ; these are inserted in 

 the Appendix. Abundance of fine fresh water was found upon the large pieces 

 of floe-ice to which the ships were fast, and this opportunity was, as usual, 

 taken to fill as much as we required, as well as to wash the ships' com- 

 panies' clothes. 



Thurs. 5. A fresh breeze from the W.S.W. springing up on the morning of the 5th, 

 accompanied by clearer weather, we cast off to try what could be done, and 

 succeeded in pushing the ships in-shore, where we found a "lane" of tolerably 

 open water, owing to the ebb-tide having set the ire off in a body. As this 

 tide was now a lee one, however, we could with difficulty keep the ships to 

 windward under a press of sail ; and, as soon as we had come to the end of 

 the lane, were under the necessity of driving back to the eastward, the 

 little distance we had gained. We had now only advanced within five or six 

 miles of the south point of Resolution Island, which, by our observations, 

 lies in lat. 61° 20' 40", long. 64° 55' 15". The former of these, which 

 is the result of several meridian altitudes, is eight miles to the southward of 

 the position usually assigned to this headland in the charts. A league or 

 two to the eastward of this, we observed two openings having the appear- 

 ance of harbours, which I should have been glad to examine, but that I had 

 found the flood-tide always set directly in towards the land for the first or 

 second quarter. As this was now about to make, it became necessary to 

 the safety of the ships to gain an offing, in order to interpose some ice be- 

 tween them and the shore. We accordingly stood off for a few miles, and 

 then made fast to a floe-piece, just as the ice came crowding back from the 

 eastward with the flood-tide. The stream of the ebb ran, in the offing, till 

 seven o'clock this evening, and we could perceive that it remained slack for 

 a very short time. 



Frid. 6. The wind shifted to the south-eastward in the course of the night, with a 

 strong breeze and heavy rain ; and, on the following morning, when the 

 ebb-tide opened the ice a little, a considerable swell was admitted from the 

 sea, causing the ships to strike violently and almost constantly on the 



