G8 
GODSEND LEDGE. 
which fx’om our lofty eminence looked like the merest 
ink-spots on a table-cloth, not a mark of water could be 
seen. I could see our eastern or Greenland coast ex¬ 
tending on, headland after headland, no less than five 
of them in number, until they faded into the mys¬ 
terious North. Every thing else, Ice! 
“Up to this time we have had but two reliable ob¬ 
servations to determine our geographical position since 
entering Smith’s Sound. These, however, were care¬ 
fully made on shore by theodolite and artificial hori¬ 
zons; and, if our five chronometers, rated but two 
weeks ago at Upernavik, are to be depended upon, 
there can be no correspondence between my own and 
the Admiralty charts north ot latitude TS° 18'. Not 
only do I remove the general coast-line some two de¬ 
grees in longitude to the eastward, but its trend is 
altered sixty degrees of angular measurement. No 
landmarks of my predecessor, Captain Inglefield, are 
recognisable/ 155 
“ In the afternoon came a gale from the southward. 
We had some rough rubbing from the floe-pieces, with 
three heavy hawsers out to the rocks of our little ice¬ 
breaker ; but we held on. Toward midnight, our six- 
inch line, the smallest of the three, parted; but the 
other two held bravely. Feeling what good service 
this island has done us, what a Godsend it was to 
reach her, and how gallantly her broken rocks have 
protected us from the rolling masses ol ice that grind 
by her, we have agreed to remember this anchorage as 
‘Godsend Ledge.’ 
