OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 
23 
entering the ice by the apprehension of being beset. By taking advantage 1819. 
of every little opening that is afforded, I believe that a strong-built vessel of 
proper size and weight may, in most seasons, be pushed through this barrier 
which occupies the centre part of Baffin’s Bay, about this parallel of latitude. 
It must, at the same time, be confessed, that, had we not been favoured 
with strong south-easterly winds, it would probably have required several 
days longer to effect this passage. 
On the 29th, we had so much clear water, that the ships had a very per- Thur. 29. 
ceptible pitching motion, which, from the closeness of the ice, does not 
very often occur in the Polar regions, and which is, therefore, hailed with 
pleasure, as an indication of an open sea. At noon we had reached, by the 
dead reckoning, the latitude of 73° 51' 17", and longitude 67° 47' 51 ", and 
we could find no bottom with three hundred and ten fathoms of line. At 
five P. M. the swell increased considerably, and, as the wind freshened up 
from the north-east, the ice gradually disappeared ; so that by six o’clock we 
were sailing in an open sea, perfectly free from obstruction of any kind. 
During the time we had been beset among the ice, the temperature of the 
air, in the shade, had varied from 28° to 38°, except in very clear and calm 
weather, when the thermometer had occasionally risen to 42°. The tem- 
perature of the water had been almost uniformly from 31° to 33°, but 
soon after our leaving the ice this evening, it increased to 37°, which tem- 
perature continued for a run of sixty-three miles to the westward, and then 
fell to 32° and 33°, till we had entered Sir James Lancaster’s Sound. 
At four A. M. on the 30th, two or three ice-bergs were in sight, being the Frid. 30. 
first we had seen since leaving the ice to the eastward. It is probable that 
these, together with some streams of ice which occurred in the afternoon, pro- 
duced the diminution in the temperature of the sea, to which I have alluded 
above, and which took place soon after noon on this day. The Griper detain- 
ing us considerably, and the sea being now sufficiently open to allow us to 
take her in tow, we hove-to at nine A. M. for that purpose. 
We now seemed all at once to have got into the head-quarters of the 
whales. They were so numerous that I directed the number to be counted 
during each watch, and no less than eighty-two are mentioned in this day’s 
log. Mr. Allison, the Greenland master, considered them generally as 
large ones, and remarked, that a fleet of whalers might easily have obtained 
a cargo here in a few days. It is, I believe, a common idea among the 
Greenland fishermen, that the presence of ice is necessary to ensure the 
