Ice for a time prevented the farther western progress of the vessels, and they sailed one hundred and twenty miles to the South, in a sound which they called Prince Regent's Inlet. Parry suspected, though incorrectly, that this inlet communicated with Hudson's Bay. Returning to the mouth of the inlet, he found the sea to the westward still encumbered with ice; but a heavy blow, accompanied with rain, soon broke it up and dispersed it. They proceeded slowly on, naming every cape and bay which they passed: an inlet of large size they called Wellington, "after his Grace the Master of the Ordnance." Being now convinced that the passage through which they had thus far ascended was a strait connecting two seas, Parry gave it the name of Barrow's Strait, after Mr. Barrow, Secretary of the Admiralty. The prospects of success during the coming six weeks were now felt by the commander of the expedition to be "truly exhilarating."
An island—by far the largest Parry had seen in these waters—appeared early in September, and the men worked their arduous way along its southern coast, till, on the 4th, they reached the longitude of 110° west. The two ships then became entitled to the sum of £5000,—the reward offered by Parliament to the first of his Majesty's subjects that should penetrate thus far to the westward within the Arctic Circle. The island was called Melville Island, from the First Lord of the Admiralty. In a bay named The Bay of the Hecla and Griper, the anchor was dropped for the first time since leaving England; the ensigns and pennants were hoisted, and the British flag waved in a region believed to be without the pale of the habitable world.
The summer was now at its close, and it became necessary to make a selection of winter quarters. A harbor was found, a passage-way cut through two miles of ice, and the ships settled in five fathoms' water: they were soon firmly frozen in at a cable's-length from the shore. Hunting, botanizing, excursions upon the island, experiments in an observatory erected on shore, and amateur theatricals, afforded some relief from the unavoidable inactivity to which officers and crew were now condemned. Parry had named the group of islands of which Melville is the largest, the North Georgian Islands, in honor of King George; and during the days of constant darkness a weekly newspaper, entitled "The North Georgia Gazette and Winter Chronicle," was edited by Captain Sabine, the astronomer.
CUTTING IN.
CUTTING OUT.
The sun reappeared on the 3d of February, 1820, after an absence of ninety-one days. The theatre was soon closed and the newspaper discontinued. The ice around the ships was seven feet thick, though by the middle of May the crews had cut it away so as to allow the ships to float, and had sawed a channel for their boats. On the 1st of August, there was not the slightest symptom of a thaw; on the 2d, the ice broke up and disappeared with a suddenness altogether inexplicable. Parry determined to return home at once, and arrived at Leith, in Scotland, towards the close of October. He was received with great favor, and was rewarded for his signal services by promotion to the rank of captain.
Parry made a second voyage in 1821, with instructions to seek a passage by Hudson's Strait instead of by Lancaster Sound. It was totally unsuccessful. He made a third attempt, in 1824, with the Fury and the Hecla. The Fury was lost in Lancaster Sound, and Parry returned baffled and for a time disheartened.