SECOND VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY. 



183 



CHAPTER VIII. 



CHARTS DRAWN BY THE ESQUIMAUX ILLNESS AMONG THEM A JOURNEY PERFORMED 



ACROSS WINTER ISLAND SUFFERINGS OF THE PARTY BY FROST FURTHER NOTICE 



OF THE ESQUIMAUX CHARTS DEPARTURE OF SOME OF THESE PEOPLE, AND A SEPARATE 



VILLAGE ESTABLISHED ON THE ICE VARIOUS METEOROLOGICAL PHENOMENA 



OKOTOOK AND HIS WIFE BROUGHT ON BOARD ANECDOTES RELATING TO THEM 



SHIPS RELEASED FROM THE ICE BY SAWING. 



Little as w r e considered ourselves to stand in need of any auxiliary re- 

 sources for the complete occupation of our time during the winter, it must 

 be confessed that the arrival of the Esquimaux served in no small degree to 

 enliven us at this season ; and, from the quickness with which the last month 

 had appeared to pass by, we were not sorry to have dispensed with the 

 necessity of putting to the test with what degree of patience Ave might other- 

 wise have borne the remaining period of our confinement. 



Our invalid, Reid, continued about this time much the same as before, 

 being sometimes better and sometimes worse, but without any permanent 

 or material alteration in either way, except that which a long and tedious 

 confinement must necessarily produce. We had now also an addition to our 

 sick-list in the ship's cook, who complained of a severe pain in the upper 

 part of his thigh, the bone of which had been shattered several years before 

 by a musket-ball. It was for a few days uncertain whether this pain was 

 rheumatic, or whether any matter was forming in the wound. The latter, 

 however, proved to be the case, and an incision having been made, the cook 

 was able to return to his duty in a short time. 



The thermometer rose gradually from — 35° on the morning of the 1st of 

 March to — 11° at night, and on the following day it had reached + 2°, being Sat. 2. 

 the first time we had seen it above zero since Christmas. This increase of 

 temperature had been accompanied, or perhaps caused, by a change of wind 



