146 Notice of Caf lain Parris’s Voyage of Discovery. 
is there inconsiderable^ but from the north-west or the Icy Sea ; 
by which conclusion all the difficulties with regard to the tides 
are easily solved This reasoning is so satisfactory, as to leave 
little doubt on our mind, that some of the inlets on the north 
coast of Hudsoifs Bay, particularly that named Repulse Bay, 
and another to the eastward of it, lead into the Polar Sea. The 
exploration of these inlets will, we hope, be again attempted, if 
it should not previously be accomplished by Lieutenant Frank- 
lin’s expedition in its course eastward. 
The opinion of geographers that West Greenland is probably 
an island, and that therefore Baffin’s Bay communicates with 
the Arctic Ocean through some of its Sounds, is founded on a 
variety of circumstances, of which the following may be enume- 
rated. 1. The existence of a current . setting from the north. 
% The floating of icebergs and of drift-wood to the southward 
by this current. 3. The fact of whales wounded in the sea 
around Spitzbergen having been caught in Davis’ Strait. 4. 
and lastly, The insular position of the land, as represented on 
skins by the native inhabitants of the country. These, and 
many other facts of the same description that might be stated, 
warranted geographers in their conclusions, that Baffin’s Bay 
was not shut up to the north and west by continuous land ; but, 
on the contrary, was connected with the Polar Sea by Sounds, 
and excited a strong desire that an opportunity might be offer- 
ed, of enabling navigators to examine these openings with greater 
care than had hitherto been the case. Accordingly, the Admi- 
ralty fitted out an expedition for Baffin’s Bay, placed it under the 
command of Captain Boss and Lieutenant Parry, and instructed 
them to endeavour, if possible, to make a passage from the Bay 
through some of the Sounds into the Polar Sea, and from thence 
to proceed onwards to the South Sea, through Behring’s Strait -f*. 
Of this expedition, an account has been already laid before our 
readers in the 1st volume of this Journal, from which it appears, 
* Vide Scoi-seby’s Arctic Regions^ and Ellis’s Voyage to Hudson's Bay. 
*{■ Mr Barrow, the celebrated geographer and traveller, to whom the scientific 
world is under so many obligations, was, we understand, the person who first con- 
ceived the plan of this and also of the recent Arctic Expedition, and who, by his 
enlightened views and indefatigable zeal and activity, contributed most materially 
to the final adoption and execution of these memorable enterprizes. 
