OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



357 



moved ; and the island now affording us no shelter and the night being toler- ^J^- 

 ably clear and fine, we weighed after dark, to avoid incurring further damage <J^L» 

 to our ground tackle, in which our losses had already been serious ones. 



The time had now arrived when I could no longer consider it prudent to Tues. 24. 

 venture the ships at sea; for with ten hours of darkness in the four-and- 

 twenty, a low temperature, and at times a considerable sea, it may readily 

 be supposed that our situation was one of almost constant and unavoidable 

 danger. Besides, on an unknown coast such as that I had purposed to ex- 

 amine, it occupies nearly one-half of a short day in looking out for ancho- 

 rage for the ensuing night, and that perhaps after all affording no security 

 to the ships, with much risk to the ground-tackle. These considerations 

 appeared to me so important, and the probability so small of effecting any 

 thing that could eventually promote our main object, that I determined on 

 running the ships over to Igloolik, before the strong autumnal equinoctial 

 gales usual in these regions should come on. Making sail therefore for 

 the island, we discovered it at half -past ten A.M., though such was the dif- 

 ficulty of distinguishing this from Neerlo-nakto, or either from the main-land, 

 on account of the snow that covered them that, had it not been for the Es- 

 quimaux huts, we should not easily have recognised the place. At noon we 

 arrived off the point where the tents had first been pitched, and were imme- 

 diately greeted by a number of the Esquimaux, who came running down to 

 the beach, shouting and jumping with all their might. The soundings, 

 though regularly decreasing, are shoal off this point ; and the Fury in standing 

 in shoaled the water to four fathoms and a half, at the distance of half a mile ; 

 but by keeping out a little, and proceeding with caution along the south 

 shore of the island, we deepened to twenty, and being then led more off 

 the land, found no bottom with the hand-leads. Making a tack towards the 

 island we again came into regular soundings ; and at half-past two P.M. an- 

 chored in ten fathoms on a muddy bottom at the distance of two-thirds of a 

 mile from the shore. 



As soon as we had anchored I went on shore, accompanied by several of 

 the officers, to pay the Esquimaux a visit, a crowd of them meeting us as 

 usual on the beach and greeting us with every demonstration of joy. They 

 seemed disappointed that we had not reached Akkoolee, for they always re- 

 ceive with eagerness any intelligence of their distant country-people. Many 

 of them, and Toolemak among the number, frequently repeated the expres- 

 sions, " Owyak Na-o / " (no summer,) " Took-too Na-o ! " (no rein-deer,) which 



