166 
CORRESPONDENCE. 
the pack only two days ago (April 25), and expect to reach Holstein- 
borg to-morrow, where I intend spending a fortnight to recruit and refit. 
Poor Lady Franklin—-I greatly pity her—it is an intense disappoint¬ 
ment ; with us it is over, but she has yet to learn it! How for our winter 
and our ice-drift. 
“ Having got the ship into as safe a nook in a stout old floe as I could 
when we were first beset, we did not receive any squeezes, and soon 
became firmly frozen in • and although at intervals during the whole 
winter wide lanes of water would open, and again these would close, 
the ice-edges meeting and crushing up with more than sufficient force to 
crush the strongest ships, yet we were unharmed,—no violent pressure 
ever taking place within fifty yards of us. The ice carried us about with 
every wind; but as northerly winds blow almost incessantly throughout 
the winter, we travelled a long way to the south. 
“ In October we were in latitude 75J°H., and longitude 70° W. By 
February 1, 1858, we were abreast of TJppernavik, in latitude 72|° H., 
and longitude 61° W. By the 1st April we were in latitude 68° H., and 
longitude 59° W. On the 13th we passed near the position of He Haven, 
when he got out of the pack after his winter’s ice-drift from Wellington 
Channel (June 5, 1851). On the 25th, when we were able to effect our 
escape, we were in latitude 63° 40' H., and longitude 59° W. To this 
I have only to add our position when we first became helpless and com¬ 
menced drifting with the ice on August 18 : latitude 75° 17' H., longi¬ 
tude 62° 8' W. 
u If you take a Baffin’s Bay chart, and draw a zigzag line through 
these points, you will at once see clearly where we have spent our winter. 
Being a solitary little vessel, with a small crew, our winter was extremely 
monotonous. The Doctor (Walker) and I got as much amusement out of 
the meteorological observations as we could. We took the temperature, the 
barometer, the aneroid, the winds, and weather, the ozone, and the thick¬ 
ness of the ice and snow, continually. Moreover, Walker was continually 
on the look-out for auroras, parhelia, haloes, snow crystals, &c», and was 
sometimes successful in catching electricity, detecting its presence in the 
atmosphere by means of a gold-leaf electrometer and copper wire attached 
aloft. Hobson, Young, and Petersen were always on the look-out for 
something to shoot, and succeeded in killing and securing seventy-one 
seals, two bears, one fox, and a few dovekies. The take of seals is unpre¬ 
cedented, and has supplied our dogs with food up to the present time. 
The fox was killed when we were 120 geographical (140 English) miles 
from the nearest land, and he was very fat, living upon such few dove¬ 
kies as were silly enough to spend their winter in the pack. The men 
have behaved admirably, always cheerful, and full of high hopes,— 
thorough-going men of war’s men. 
“We had our school during the winter evenings, when Walker and 
Young taught navigation, writing, and arithmetic. Walker also gave a 
few lectures on popular subjects, and every Sunday evening has made a 
practice of reading a portion of the Hew Testament, and explaining it 
to such of the men as chose to attend. The last week in the ‘ pack’ was 
