46 



SECOND VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 



Lieutenant Reid returned on board at eleven P.M., having determined 

 the continuity of land all round the bay, by rowing close in-shore the whole 

 way. With a view to ascertain, if possible, the breadth of the low land, 

 by which the geographical position of the eastern boundary of the Welcome 

 in this latitude might have been laid down, Lieutenant Reid went on shore 

 near the head of the bay ; but it proved so level, extensive, and low, that 

 he was unable to obtain any view to the westward. He considered the 

 southern boundary of the bay to be ten miles from the station of the ships. 

 The soundings are regular, and the anchorage good in every part which our 

 boats visited, making this, perhaps, one of the most secure and extensive 

 harbours in the known world. Scarcely a piece of ice was seen in any part 

 of it, and the appearance of the beach, on which were no heavy grounded 

 masses, shewed that here, as in all other well-sheltered harbours or inlets in 

 the polar seas, little or none had ever found access, except that which is 

 formed in it, and which the annual process of dissolution has usually 

 destroyed before this period. In the examination of any inlet in these regions 

 there is, indeed, no indication more unpromising, and which, if any thing 

 short of absolute examination could be admitted, might be considered so 

 conclusive against the existence of a passage, as the absence of "old" ice, 

 or, at least, of those traces of it, which are evident upon every shore to 

 which it has occasionally a ready access. Of this fact, the remaining part of 

 the present season's navigation will afford a striking proof. 



This magnificent bay, possessing so many advantages that would render it 

 invaluable in a more temperate climate, the officers honoured with the name 

 of the Duke of York's Bay, in consequence of the Expedition having first 

 entered it on the birth-day of His Royal Highness. 



It being now evident that the inlet into which, in the course of our en- 

 deavours to penetrate to the westward, we had unavoidably been led, would 

 afford us no passage in that direction, I gave orders for weighing at the turn 

 of tide; being determined at once to run back through the narrow channel by 

 which we had entered, and to push to the northward without delay, in 

 search of some more favourable opening. The tide, in our present anchor- 

 age, flowed to the southward and ebbed to the northward ; and it now be- 

 came apparent that, notwithstanding the care taken to ascertain the direc- 

 tion of the flood-tide in the entrance to this bay, we had been mistaken in 

 supposing it to come from the westward. For, as the tide of ebb unquestion- 

 ably ran to the southward about Point Henderson, and no opening occurs 



