For Thirteen Hours The Watchers Kept Their Post; One Had His
Trumpet With Him, For He Was A Trumpeter, The Other Had A Gun.
They
trumpeted often and loudly; they fired, but no answer came.
They
watched ashore all night for the return of their captain and his
party, "but they came not at all."
The season is advanced. As we sail on, the sea steams like a line-
kiln, "frost-smoke" covers it. The water, cooled less rapidly, is
warmer now than the surrounding air, and yields this vapour in
consequence. By the time our vessel has reached Baffin's Bay, still
coasting along Greenland, in addition to old floes and bergs, the
water is beset with "pancake ice." That is the young ice when it
first begins to cake upon the surface. Innocent enough it seems,
but it is sadly clogging to the ships. It sticks about their sides
like treacle on a fly's wing; collecting unequally, it destroys all
equilibrium, and impedes the efforts of the steersman. Rocks split
on the Greenland coast with loud explosions, and more icebergs fall.
Icebergs we soon shall take our leave of; they are only found where
there is a coast on which glaciers can form; they are good for
nothing but to yield fresh water to the vessels; it will be all
field, pack, and saltwater ice presently.
Now we are in Baffin's Bay, explored in the voyages of Bylot and
Baffin, 1615-16. When, in 1817, a great movement in the Greenland
ice caused many to believe that the northern passages would be found
comparatively clear; and when, in consequence of this impression,
Sir John Barrow succeeded in setting afoot that course of modern
Arctic exploration which has been continued to the present day, Sir
John Ross was the first man sent to find the North-West Passage.
Buchan and Parry were commissioned at the same the to attempt the
North Sea route.
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