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neighbours do, and which all nations, savage and civilized, with certain modifications, seem to entertain. But I must quit the subject of these people, lest I should tire you. One circumstance, however, I cannot pass over, which is this, that their winter habitations were to the northward, and that they came down south to pass the summer where there is more ice and snow, and consequently more food to be had than in the former situation, a seeming paradox, the truth of which, however, was completely verified by us. On the very northern summit of Baffin's Bay, which could not be less than 78°, there was much less snow on the land, and much less ice on the water, than we had hitherto met with in any part of Davis Straits, and these people had told us that we should find it so; well, therefore, might our new friends deem this the happy country, and conclude that all the world to the south of them was ice and snow! And if good looks and a cheerful demeanour may be considered as indications of happiness, they were certainly in the enjoyment of it: they were all in excellent keeping, with faces as round as the full moon, and exceedingly like the people of Kamschatka and the Aleutian Islands. Their dogs, too, were in excellent condition: they have long bushy tails like the fox, a rough straggling mane round the neck, and have a general resemblance to the wolf: they seem very quiet, and never bark; but a young dog, since its arrival at Deptford, has learnt to bark as loud and long as the noisiest dog in the place.

A breeze of wind, and an open sea, were occurrences of too rare and important a nature to be neglected, and we accordingly availed ourselves of them, and steered to the northward, leaving these children of nature, and, as we deemed them, of misery, without the smallest reluctance; for, in fact, they at last became bold and troublesome, and attempted to steal every thing they could lay hands on. We had not proceeded far, when a singular appearance, of a deep crimson colour, on the surface of the snow, by the sides of the hills, attracted our attention, and the more so when we found it continuing in patches, for an extent of ten or twelve miles. Hav ing landed near to one of the patches, we collected a considerable quantity of

it, melted the snow, and preserved the colouring matter which it deposited. Various conjectures were hazarded as to this curious matter, and all the three kingdoms of nature were put in requisition. Many a page was turned over in our books of knowledge, with which the Admiralty had liberally supplied us; and, at length, some one, Captain Sabine, I believe, found, in Rees' Cyclopedia, the very thing we were in search of, under the word "Snow ;" but the account there given, left us just where we started. Saussure, it told us, found snow of a bright red colour, on the Alps, and considered the colouring matter as the farina of some plant, while M. Ramond, who found the same kind of snow on the Pyrenees, concluded it to be of mineral origin, and we now learn since our return, that ours at least is neither the one nor the other, but an animal substance, the excrement of birds, as Mr Brande supposes, from the quantity of Uric acid it is found to contain ; and I have no doubt but he is right, for in the very neighbourhood of it were such myriads of birds, of the Auk kind (Aĺea Alce), that when they rose up from the ice or the snow, they li terally darkened the sky; and close to the spot where we landed, was one of their breeding places. If I say that they sometimes appeared in hundreds of thousands, or even millions, it will not give you an adequate idea of their numbers. We shot as many as we pleased, and fed the whole ship's company with them, being very palatable food, free from all fishy taste or smell, and they made most excellent soup. We used to bring down from twenty or thirty at a single shot; and as we had reason to believe that these vast multitudes were chiefly confined to the upper part of Baffins Bay, we laid in a stock for future supply, by plac ing them in casks, with layers of pounded ice between them.

Having passed Cape Dudley Digges, we opened out a sound or strait, which was considered to be that of Baffin, named "Wolstenholm's Sound;" but the shallowness of the water, and the ice within it, gave no hopes of a passage that way, and we accordingly passed it at the distance of 15 or 20 miles. The "Whale Sound" of Baffin was not more promising; but it appeared to many very desireable that we should have approached somewhat

nearer to "Sir Thomas Smith's Sound," at the north-western extremity of the bay, which presented a very wide opening; but we passed it at the distance of 50 or 60 miles. The land now stretched S. W., and we ran parallel with it, but at so considerable a distance, that it was only to be seen at intervals, when the weather cleared up, which it did, sufficiently to let us see another opening, which we were willing to recognize as " Alderman Jones' Sound," of Baffin. The weather was in general mild and exceedingly pleasant, and the sea in the whole of the upper part of the bay, almost wholly free from ice, excepting now and then a solitary ice-berg, floating, or a-ground. By the way, we could have no doubt, from the immense glaciers which filled the vallies along the shores of Baffin's Bay, and the great depth of water close in with them, that the many hundreds of these enormous masses we met with in our progress through Davis' Straits, some a-ground, and others a-float, had their origin in this bay. The appearance of these bergs is singularly curious, exhibiting the ruined forms of castles and cathedrals, with their walls, gates, towers, and spires, in every state of decay; and they are sometimes so completely perforated, that boats may sail through them, in which case, if the sun should happen to shine out, it is impossible to conceive a more brilliant sight than that which is then displayed. It is a scene to be met with only in the Arabian Nights Entertainments; or if we are to look for its parallel in real life, Hancock's glass shop in Cockspur street, in a sunny morning in the month of May, is the picture in miniature of an excavated ice-berg.

On the 30th August, when in latitude 744, or thereabouts, we suddenly deepened our water from 150 or 160 fathoms, to the amazing depth of 750 fathoms, and encreased its temperature from 32° to 36°. On the weather clearing up, we found ourselves a-breast of a large opening, which we had no doubt, from its latitude, was that named by Baffin," Sir James Lancaster's Sound." From the northern to the southern headlands, it appeared to be at least 50 miles in width. As we knew that Baffin had not entered this sound, but stood away from it to the south eastward, its appearance inspired hope and joy into every countenance;

and every officer and man, on the instant as it were, made up his mind that this must be the north-west passage ;— the width of the opening, the extraordinary depth of water, the increased temperature, and the surrounding sea, and the Strait so perfectly free from ice, that not a particle was seen floating, were circumstances so encouraging, and so different from any thing we had yet seen, that every heart panted to explore this passage which was to conduct us all to glory and to fortune. We had hitherto met with nothing that could in the smallest degree damp our spirits; we had lived well, suffered no fatigue, either from anxiety or bodily exertion; we had seen nothing like danger; and we had been animated by one sentiment; but nothing had yet occurred to inspire us with the hope of success in the great enterprise; we had proceeded cheerfully, but without enthusiasm, and our ardour had rather diminished as we begun to diminish our latitude. But to find so grand an opening under such circumstances as I have mentioned, and in the very spot too of all others, most likely to lead us at once to the northern coast of America, was so unexpected, and at the same time so exhilarating, that I firmly believe every creature on board anticipated the pleasure of writing an overland dispatch to his friend, either from the eastern or the western shores of the Pacific. We stood directly into this spacious inlet; the width continued pretty nearly the same, as far as we could see, and not a particle of ice on the water; neither was there any appearance of land a-head. Every breast beat high, and every one was desirous to mount the crows-nest, to look out for the opening which should conduct us into the Polar Sea, near the coast of the main-land of America. We had not run, however, above ten leagues within the inlet, when the Isabella bore up, and of course, the Alexander did the same, and we stood out of the inlet; why, we could not conjecture, but under all sail. Our commodore, as it afterwards appeared, had seen the land at the bottom of the inlet. It is impossible to describe to you the gloom that was immediately spread over every countenance, all their sanguine hopes being thus unexpectedly dashed to the ground. At the very spot where the Isabella bore up, the depth of water was 650 fathoms, and

the temperature continued the same as at the entrance: the Alexander was about four or five miles a-stern of her consort at that time; but not the least appearance of land was visible in the direction of the inlet from her crowsnest.*

On passing near the southern point of Lancaster Sound, the depth of water had increased to upwards of 1,000 fathoms. Close to this point we landed on a fine sloping sandy beach, at the bottom of a little bay, into which a river of running water was falling, whose width might be from 50 to 60 yards, and the water above knee deep. The flat ground through which it ran was free from ice, and appeared to be covered with a tolerably good soil, in which were growing a variety of plants. On the banks were found a piece of a fir-tree, or branch, about five inches in diameter, and a piece of birch bark. We went through the ceremony of taking possession of this land in the name of his Majesty, which, I fear, is only putting "a barren sceptre in his hand," though of all the places we had yet seen since we crossed the Arctic circle, this is by far the most inviting; and, indeed, were it not for the high peaked mountains, partially covered with snow, which bound the valley on each side, we could not possibly have supposed ourselves to be in the high latitude of 74°, especially on looking seaward, and seeing not a particle of ice as far as the eye could reach.

The month of September had now set in, and the disappointment experienced in Lancaster Sound cast a damp on all our future proceedings. We continued to the south-eastward, along the land, which we saw at intervals, but kept at a very respectable distance from it. We saw several openings, but examined none. The sea continued clear of ice, and the weather moderate, but seldom clear. We landed somewhere about lat. 70, and found traces of natives, but saw none. Near this place too we fell in with the largest iceberg which had yet occurred. The Alexander's boat

The Crows-Nest is a kind of box, sufficient to hold a man; generally a cask, fixed near the mast-head, to protect the observer from cold, and enable him to look out for whales, or open pieces of water. EDITOR.

Vol. IV.

was three hours nearly in rowing round it. It was found, by measurement, to be upwards of two miles in length, and almost as many in breadth, and above fifty feet above the surface. All hands began to calculate its contents in cubic feet, which my memory will not allow me to state, but its weight was settled to be some twelve or thirteen millions of tons. On the summit of this iceberg was a large bear, who, in perceiving us advance to attack him, made a plunge into the sea, from the height of fifty feet, and escaped from his pursuers.

We continued to trace the land down to Cape Walsingham, which forms the northern side of the entrance into Cumberland Straits, up which old Davis proceeded 180 miles; we did not, however, once attempt to look at them, but shaped our course from hence to Cape Farewell. Here, however, we encountered a most tremendous gale of wind, in which the ships separated, and saw nothing of each other again till their arrival in Brassa Sound, on the 30th October, after a passage of three weeks across the Atlantic, and within three hours of each other. During this passage, we had the Aurora Borealis very frequently, and sometimes very grand and beautiful, but we could not perceive that it had the smallest influence on the magnetic needle, as we had been taught to expect, though this phenomenon is unquestionably connected with magnetism some way or other, as the great luminous arch was generally, though not invariably, bisected by the magnetic meridian.

You will probably expect from me some opinion as to the existence and practicability of a north-west passage; but I really feel myself to be utterly unable to give any well-founded opinion on the subject. I may, however, with safety assert, that our observations have not supplied us with any grounds whatever for stating, as I perceive has been positively stated in the newspapers, and apparently on demiofficial authority, that there is no passage from Baffin's Bay into the Pacific. I am perfectly certain, that no officer employed on the expedition ventured to hazard such an assertion, because no one is competent to make up his mind to such a decision. But, were I compelled to deliver my sentiments on this interesting question, I should say 2 X

that the whole of this land, from Wolstenhelm's Sound round the head of Baffin's Bay, and down to the northern coast of Labrador, is so intersected by numerous straits or inlets, that, as far as appearances go, the land on the western side of Davis' Strait and Baffin's Bay is formed into a great cluster or archipelago of islands, beyond which is the polar sea; but whether all, or any, of these straits are, or are not, navigable, is a question that yet remains to be decided, and which nothing can decide but practical experience; and this I have reason to believe to be the opinion entertained at head-quarters; for I am extremely happy to inform you, that the Admiralty have allowed the crews of the two ships to volunteer their services, as it is understood, for another expedition next year; and it is almost unnecessary to add, every one to a man has volunteered for this service.

To say that we have done nothing, would not be the truth; to say that we are satisfied with what we have done, would be equally untrue;-and yet the voyage has not been abortive. If we had done nothing more than that of narrowing the ground of inquiry, it would be something; but it will be found that we have accomplished more than this. We have swung the pendulum in latitudes where it was never swung before; and we have made such experiments on the dip and variation of the magnetic needle, close to the magnetic pole, as cannot fail to clear up, in a very considerable degree, the mystery which hangs over this intricate subject. Our sudden departure from Doncaster Sound was a subject of so much deeper regret, as we had found, close to that inlet, the variation of the compass above 110° west, and the dip to exceed 86°; so that, had we continued a very few degrees of longitude to the westward, perhaps 100 or 120 miles, we should certainly have stood on the magnetic poles, where in all probability our compasses would have ceased to act, at least with any degree of certainty, on board ship, as we found that the local attraction of the iron in the ships (and ́especially the Alexander) increased with the increase of the dip and variation; and that the magnetic polar attraction decreased in the same proportion; so that, at last, our compasses became so sluggish and so variable,

that very little dependence could be placed on them. On this subject our journals teem with observations made in the ship, and on the ice, with facts that must give a deathblow to the theory of Captain Flanders, and some other ingenious men, who, from a few facts, collected probably with no great care, raise a system in their closets, which, when submitted to the test of experience, are found wofully wanting.

These few loose, hastily written hints, which I have thrown together while the ships are preparing to be paid off, will in some measure put you in possession of the outlines of our proceedings, though they are not calculated to satisfy a curiosity so ardent as I know yours to be. But I must reserve the rest till I have the pleasure of seeing you, which, I trust, will not be longer than ten days hence. In the meantime, I am, &c.

Deptford, 1st Dec. 1818.

P. S. We have just heard that two gun-brigs have been ordered up from Chatham to Deptford, to be prepared immediately for a particular service, which every body here says is for the further prosecution of the North-westpassage.-God grant it may be so, and that I may be fortunate enough to be again employed in this interesting enterprise.

VERSIFICATION OF A PASSAGE IN PURCHAS.

WILLIAM CROWE, Esq., the public orator to the university of Oxford, on reading from Purchas the passage which Barrow has taken for a motto to his " History of the Arctic Voyages," was so forcibly struck with the grandeur of the imagery, and with the poetical manner in which it was expressed, that he sat down and versified the passage, almost without altering, omitting, or adding a single word, as will be seen when comparing them.

"How shall I admire your heroicke courage, ye marine worthies, beyond all names of worthiness! that neyther dread so long eyther presence or absence of the sunne; cold blasts, snowes and hayle in the ayre: nor those foggy mysts, tempestuous winds, nor the unequall seas, which might amaze the hearer and amate the beholder, where the Tritons and Neptune's selfe would quake with chilling feare, to behold such

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MR EDITOR, THE subject of education in general has been, of late years, so much a topic of discussion, and is, besides, at all times so interesting, scarcely any apology can be deemed necessary, when a professional man seeks to communicate his ideas respecting that branch of the whole, on which his opportunities have best enabled him to form a judgment. On the present occasion, accordingly, I hope to afford your readers some satisfaction, by considering at length that most important portion indicated above, which is connected with the pursuits of nearly all my past years, and which no possible combination of political circumstance can ever render altogether uninteresting to a discerning British public; and in doing this, I shall equally hope to be able to avoid giving offence any where, for I shall studiously speak of existing institutions with that respect which is especially their due from one who owes his own profes

sional proficiency, whatever it may be, exclusively to the opportunities afforded by them.:

education, may be divided into two, Naval, like every other professional its elementary and higher branches; in other words, into that degree of information which is indispensible to the whole body for the discharge of its daily duties, and that which is calculated to carry certain individuals beyond the beaten routine, and to enable them to perform, if called on, certain higher services. The first division comprises practical seamanship and navigation, to which alone, accordingly, the prescribed examination, previous to a young man's becoming eligible for promotion as lieutenant, sidered positively incomplete without is confined: the second may be conan introduction to natural history, mechanics, the higher branches of mathematics, natural philosophy, astronomy, and the like; but may also be extended even indefinitely beyond these bounds, for what science is there in truth which may be deemed positively useless in the conduct of a voyage of discovery, or other similar service, what acquisition can never be brought into play in the varied circumstances of a seaman's life?

A brief statement of the opportunities afforded by the existing institutions of our service for acquiring proficiency in these several departments, and of the degree in which they are for the most part improved; together with some suggestions for a partial change in these institutions, by which, with little expense, and, it is presumed, great profit, the opportunities in question might be materially multiplied and increased-these form the direct objects aimed at in the following remarks.

There are two ways, it is well known, in which a bey, destined for the navy, may fulfil its requisitions preparatory to promotion in its ranks. He may be entered, at the age of thirteen, on board one of his Majesty's ships, where six years actual service as midshipman entitles him to demand that he be examined touching his capacity to undertake the charge and fulfil the duties of a lieutenant or he may be sent at the age of twelve to Portsmouth academy, an institution, it must be premised, on a very limited scale, and to which, accordingly, only very

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