A few miles north of Cape Lupton, while smashing through a narrow tongue of ice, a sudden swirl of the current which at times runs like a mill-race in this deep channel, swept the ice together in a way that I can only liken to the sudden scurry of fallen leaves before an autumn breeze, pinched the _Roosevelt_ between the big cakes, and smashing her against the ice-foot, ground her along its vertical face with a motion and noise like that of a railway car which has left the rails and is bumping along over the ties. Very fortunately for us she scraped into a shallow niche in the ice-wall, and was hastily secured with every available line. The entire flurry lasted less than five minutes, but in that time the steering gear was almost disabled. The back of the rudder was twisted on the stock, the heavy iron head-bands and fittings broken, and the steel tiller rods snapped. Temporary repairs were effected, and as soon as the pressure relaxed we steamed on around Cape Sumner and tied up to the fast ice in Newman Bay under Cape Brevoort, to repair our damaged steering gear and await the opening of a lead across Robeson Channel to Cape Union or vicinity. [Illustration: BRINGING OFF THE “POLARIS” BOAT FROM BOAT CAMP, NEWMAN BAY ] [Illustration: CAPE SUMNER, GREENLAND ] [Illustration: BIRTHDAY CAPE, WRANGEL BAY, GRINNELL LAND ] The winter’s ice was still intact in the bay, its surface level and granular, and the pools of water upon it covered with ice strong enough to support a man’s weight. As soon as the lines were secured I walked ashore and climbed to the summit of Cape Brevoort. The crest of the northward-facing cliffs commanded the entire northern approaches to Robeson Channel, from Repulse Harbour across to Cape Rawson and southward along the Grinnell Land coast to Lady Franklin Bay. The Greenland coast south of Sumner was hidden by the cliffs of that cape. The ice all along the Grinnell Land coast, and in the centre of the channel, and to the northward as far as I could see, was densely packed. The water in which we had come north still remained open and the _Roosevelt_ could have worked her way close to the shore along the Greenland coast to Repulse Harbour and possibly to Cape Bryant, had my objective point been in that direction. No indication of lead or crack across the channel was to be seen. While on the summit a school of narwhal came sporting down the shore close to the ice-foot below us.