Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and Narrative of an Attempt to Reach the North Pole, Volume 2Parry, William Edward, Sir
History
Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and Narrative of an Attempt to Reach the North Pole, Volume 2
Parry, William Edward, Sir
Arctic regions; Northwest Passage; Parry, William Edward, Sir, 1790-1855
We halted at five A.M. on the 1st of August, the officers and men being
quite knocked up, and having made by our account only two miles of
southing over a road not less than five in length. As we came along we
had seen some recent bear-tracks, and soon after discovered Bruin
himself. Halting the boats and concealing the people behind them, we
drew him almost within gun-shot; but, after making a great many
traverses behind some hummocks, and even mounting one of them to examine
us more narrowly, he set off and escaped--I must say, to our grievous
disappointment; for we had already, by anticipation, consigned a
tolerable portion of his flesh to our cooking kettle, over a fire of his
own blubber.
In the course of our journey, on the 2d of August, we met with a
quantity of snow, tinged, to the depth of several inches, with some red
colouring matter, of which a portion was preserved in a bottle for
future examination. This circumstance recalled to our recollection our
having frequently before, in the course of this journey, remarked that
the loaded sledges, in passing over hard snow, left upon it a light,
rose-coloured tint, which, at the time, we attributed to the colouring
matter being pressed out of the birch of which they were made. Today,
however, we observed that the runners of the, boats, and even our own
footsteps, exhibited the same appearance; and, on watching it more
narrowly afterward, we found the same effect to be produced, in a
greater or less degree, by heavy pressure, on almost all the ice over
which we passed, though a magnifying glass could detect nothing to give
it this tinge. Halting at seven A.M. on the 3d, after launching and
hauling up the boats a great number of times, we had not only the
comfort of drying all our wet clothes, but were even able to wash many
of our woollen things, which dried in a few hours. The latitude observed
at noon was 82° 1' 48", or twelve miles and a half, to the southward of
our place on the 31st, which was about three more than our log gave,
though there had been southing in the wind during the whole interval.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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