OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



315 



stance rather seemed to intimate, as we afterwards found to be the case, that 1822 - 

 the shores of the Strait and its immediate neighbourhood are not a frequent J^hL' 

 resort of the natives during the summer months. 



I learned from Captain Lyon that Mr. Crozier and his party had scarcely 

 got on board the ships when the weather became extremely thick and 

 continued so all night, so that his return was very opportune, and the 

 more so, as on the following morning the whole body of western ice, in- 

 cluding that to which the ships were attached, was observed to have broken 

 up. Fortunately however the latter, by pressing against the island of Neerlo- 

 Nakto, enabled the ships for some time to retain their station and assisted in 

 keeping them off the shore ; but they were afterwards drifted about in the 

 shoal water near the island, and continued in a very unpleasant and hazard- 

 ous situation till the time of my return. Being immoveably beset by the 

 other ice that had been detached, on the night of the 17th the Fury sus- 

 tained one or two heavy " nips" by the pressure, which lifted her abaft, but 

 without any injury whatever. Great quantities of ice were observed to 

 drift past from the westward, from which direction, whenever the wind was 

 light, there appeared to be a constant current. 



If Mr. Crozier's return was opportune, mine was certainly no less so, for Wed. 21. 

 at the very time of our crossing the lane of water as mentioned above, the 

 ice was in the act of opening out, and continued to do so for the rest of the 

 night ; so that on the morning of the 21st, the ships were nearly in clear 

 water, while the weather became so thick in an hour after our arrival, that 

 we could scarcely see a quarter of a mile for two days afterwards. At 

 eight A.M. we got under way, with a view of endeavouring to find the 

 margin of the fixed floe, by which alone we could hope to hold our ground 

 against the ice which we knew to be drifting down from the westward. In 

 this attempt we succeeded, and ran along it for a short distance, when the 

 fog coming on more thick than ever, we made fast in thirty-two fathoms, 

 being about four miles to the northward and westward of Neerlo-Natko. 



On the 22d we twice made a mile or two along the edge of the floe, when- Thur. 22. 

 ever the weather permitted us to see a short distance a-head ; but the sound- 

 ings being now too deep to give us warning of our approach to the Bouverie 

 Islands, we made fast in the evening in fifty-seven fathoms, the more de- 

 cayed state of the ice appearing to indicate our being near enough to the 

 land. The wind was very light from the eastward, and the state of the 

 weather rendered the ship so moist and unwholesome below that it was 



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