The comparisons of the chronometers this day indicated that Arnold's
Numbers 2148 and 2147 had slightly changed their rates since they had
been brought on board; fortunately the rate of the former seems to have
increased nearly in the same ratio as the other has lost, and the mean
longitude will not be materially affected.
Being now fairly launched into the Atlantic I issued a general memorandum
for the guidance of the officers during the prosecution of the service on
which we were engaged, and communicated to them the several points of
information that were expected from us by my instructions. I also
furnished them with copies of the signals which had been agreed upon
between Lieutenant Parry and myself to be used in the event of our
reaching the northern coast of America and falling in with each other.
At the end of the month of June our progress was found to have been
extremely slow owing to a determined North-West wind and much sea. We had
numerous birds hovering round the ship; principally fulmars (Procellaria
glacialis) and shearwaters (Procellaria puffinus) and not unfrequently
saw shoals of grampusses sporting about, which the Greenland seamen term
finners from their large dorsal fin. Some porpoises occasionally appeared
and whenever they did the crew were sanguine in their expectation of
having a speedy change in the wind which had been so vexatiously contrary
but they were disappointed in every instance.
Thursday, July 1.
The month of July set in more favourably; and aided by fresh breezes we
advanced rapidly to the westward, attended daily by numerous fulmars and
shearwaters. The Missionary brig had parted company on the 22nd of June.
We passed directly over that part of the ocean where the Sunken Land of
Buss is laid down in the old, and continued in the Admiralty charts. Mr.
Bell, the commander of the Eddystone, informed me that the pilot who
brought his ship down the Thames told him that he had gained soundings in
twelve feet somewhere hereabout; and I am rather inclined to attribute
the very unusual and cross sea we had in this neighbourhood to the
existence of a bank than to the effect of a gale of wind which we had
just before experienced; and I cannot but regret that the commander of
the ship did not try for soundings at frequent intervals.
ENTER DAVIS STRAITS.
By the 25th July we had opened the entrance of Davis Straits and in the
afternoon spoke the Andrew Marvell, bound to England with a cargo of
fourteen fish. The master informed us that the ice had been heavier this
season in Davis Straits than he had ever recollected, and that it lay
particularly close to the westward, being connected with the shore to the
northward of Resolution Island and extending from thence within a short
distance of the Greenland coast; that whales had been abundant but the
ice so extremely cross that few could be killed.
