As the ships returned southward, they steamed through a large “polynia,” or water-space, in Kennedy Channel. It was on a still night, late in August, and the ice-locked sea was calm enough to be the veritable “Peace Pool.” A few last fragments of polar floe lay here and there in the water, strangely reflected, and a dovekie swam beside one of them. Far away to the east, between Franklin and Crozier Islands, Cape Constitution rose above a faint line of pack. It was Kane’s farthest point. From its base, Morton, looking on another such polynia, had naturally enough reported an open Polar Sea. The sea was open now as far southward as could be seen from the crow’s nest, and yet both ships were in difficulties before morning, and a hundred miles of Smith’s Sound pack still separated them from the North Water and from home.] Better fortune awaited the next effort, and on the morning of the 20th the ships fought slowly across Lady Franklin Strait. Cape Baird and Cape Leiber were passed in comparatively open water, then the ice became less and less, and as midnight approached we were astonished to find ourselves nearly sixty miles on the homeward journey, and still steaming full speed. The scene we passed through just at this time was one not easily forgotten. Under the cold yellow light of northern afterglow, Kennedy Channel lay open as far as we could see, a sheet of mirror-like water in that absolute calm peculiar to ice-locked seas. There was some low mist at the other side of the channel, probably floating over pack; through it we could distinguish the islands named after Franklin and Crozier, and between them rose Cape Constitution, the bold headland from which Morton had looked upon Kane’s open Polar Sea (Plate No. 16). As we stood on deck attempting to preserve some record of the tender tints of sea and sky in water-colour, a last fragment of heavy pack floated by, and the only dovekie we had seen for many a day swam beside it.