176 
VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 
1820. she was last caulked. I also at this time laid out a small garden, planting 
it with radishes, onions, mustard and cress ; and a similar attempt was 
made by Lieutenant Liddon: but, notwithstanding every care and attention 
which could be paid to it, this experiment may be said to have wholly failed, 
the radishes not exceeding an inch in length by the latter end of July, and 
the other seeds being altogether thrown away. Not even a single crop of 
mustard and cress could be thus raised in the open air ; and our horticulture 
was, therefore, once more confined to my cabin, where, at the present mild 
temperature of the atmosphere, those two vegetables could be raised without 
any difficulty, and in considerable abundance. I may remark, however, that 
some common ships’ peas, which were sown by our people for their amuse- 
ment, were found to thrive so well, that, had I been sooner aware of it, a 
great quantity of the leaves at least of this vegetable might have been grown, 
which, when boiled, and eaten as greens, would have been no small treat 
to persons deprived of fresh vegetable substance for more than ten months. 
It is not improbable also, that, by the assistance of glass, the want of which 
deprived us of the opportunity of making the experiment, a great deal more 
might have been done in this way, notwithstanding the miserable climate with 
which we had to contend. 
Sun. 21. About the 21st we began to perceive a daily diminution of the snow upon 
the land, the brown soil appearing in patches, where hitherto the snow had 
Mon 22. completely covered it ; and on the 22d, in the course of a walk which we 
took to the Table-hill, to the westward of the ships, we had the satisfaction 
of being able to fill a pint bottle with water from a small pool of melted snow, 
having a quantity of sand mixed with it, a circumstance which we always 
found to favour the thawing process. There cannot, perhaps, be a more 
striking proof of the extreme severity of the climate of Melville Island than 
the fact, that this was the first instance we had known of water, naturally in a 
fluid state when exposed to the atmosphere, and unassisted by artificial 
means, such as those which I have already described as having occurred in 
one or two instances under the ship’s stern, since the middle of the preceding 
September, being an interval of more than eight months. The Table-hill, 
which is seen at a great distance on the coast, in coming from the eastward, 
and which forms a conspicuous object in this country where there is so little 
to vary the scene, lies at the distance of five or six miles to the westward of 
the station of the ships in Winter Harbour. It rises about a hundred feet 
above the level of the plain on which it stands, the top of it not exceeding in 
