344 Captain Scoresby’s Journal of a Voyage to the 
carried by the westerly current prevailing on this coast, is dis- 
persed throughout the Greenland Sea. The wood is pine and 
birch. It is not uncommon to find trees imbedded, in an up- 
right position, in the middle of large sheets of ice, — a circum- 
stance which, our author remarks, is in favour of the supposition 
of such ice having been formed near land. On the 18th, they 
again fell in with ice. The day following, at noon, having had 
a good run during the night, Captain Scoresby observed in 
Lat. 68° 45', Long, by chronometer, 0° 8' W. The variation 
was found to be only 14° W., on a NE. by E. course, but the 
real variation must have been about 22°, the difference of 8°, 
being the effect of the “ local attraction’’ of the ship on the com- 
passes. 
“ The amount of ‘ deviation’ on every point not being yet ascer- 
tained, nor the points of change, we sailed in considerable uncer- 
tainty, whenever an alteration in the course was necessary. The 
Baffin having an iron-tiller, and much heavy iron- work about the 
rudder, has an extraordinary deviation in her compasses. In her 
first voyage (1820), it was still more considerable, and not a little 
dangerous before it was discovered. It produced an error of a de- 
gree of latitude in one day’s run, on a NE. by E. course, — the de- 
viation on that point being twenty-two degrees. On carrying a 
pocket compass round the quarter-deck, to ascertain the cause of 
attraction, I discovered that it was principally owing to the piping 
or chimney of the cabin-stove, which had inadvertently been made 
of sheet-iron, and had consequently an attractive energy (according 
to Mr Barlow’s investigations) equal to a pillar of solid metal, of the 
same quality and diameter. On removing this chimney, though 
eight feet distant from the binnacle, the deviation was diminished 
more than two-thirds/’ P. 21, 22. 
On Sunday, the 21st April, had a hard gale from NE. and 
NNE., but which having been foreseen by means of the- baro- 
meter, proper precautions were taken to secure the vessel from 
its effects. A little before sunset on the 22d, a weather-gall 
(or the limb of a rain-bow) of great brilliancy, appeared. The 
weather-gall is generally considered by seamen as the harbinger 
of a storm ; and we find, from the Journal, that the next day 
was stormy. On the 25th, observation was made in Lat. 75° 5'. 
For two or three nights preceding this, Captain Scoresby says 
“ we had no darkness, but only faint and diminished twilight. 
Now we were advanced into the regions of continued day, where 
the sun, for months together, sweeps round the North Pole with- 
out ever descending below the horizon.” 
