NAVIGATION COMPARATIVELY EASY. 
341 
with the clumsy appliances at his command. Com¬ 
pare his two boats with Nordenskiold’s three already 
mentioned. We ourselves had, it may be recol¬ 
lected, on some occasions to drag our boat, laden 
with her ordinary sporting and fishing gear, for 
trifling distances over the ice in our pursuit of game, 
and we had ample opportunity of gathering from our 
experience some slight notion of the great explorer’s 
difficulty ; but, with the aid of steam, Parry (there can 
now be no doubt on the matter) would that year have 
gained the object of his voyage, just as we ourselves 
might have reasonably hoped to do in our schooner ; 
for the great surface of ice when it begins to expe¬ 
rience the action of the warm current of water, and 
the great heat of the summer sun, soon breaks up, 
and the riven mass leaves long channels between the 
floating masses, and by these openings, a steamer 
properly handled might easily sail into the open water 
beyond. The ice is easily managed by the expert 
whalers, and no peculiarity in an Arctic voyage is 
more startling to the inexperienced naval officer than 
the ease with which the harpooners deal with what, to 
such a one, would seem crushing difficulties. Expe¬ 
rienced whalers are able to live, and live comfortably, 
in places where the mere man-of-war’s man would 
assuredly starve. The cunning animals of the North 
