A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18 / Historical Sketch of the Progress of Discovery, Navigation, and / Commerce, from the Earliest Records to the Beginning of the Nineteenth / Century, By William Stevenson

by Robert Kerr; William Stevenson

For some days after this, their patience was tried, and nearly exhausted, by contrary winds, but on the 3d of August a favourable and fresh breeze arose from the eastward. Advantage was immediately taken of it. "We all felt," says Captain Parry, "it was that point of the voyage which was to determine the success or failure of the expedition, according as one or other of the opposite opinions respecting the termination of the sound should be corroborated. It is more easy to imagine than to describe (he continues) the almost breathless anxiety which was now visible in every countenance, while, as the breeze increased to a fresh gale, we ran quickly up the sound. The masts' heads were crowded by the officers and men during the whole afternoon; and an unconcerned observer (if any could have been unconcerned on such an occasion) would have been amused by the eagerness with which the various reports from the crow's-nest were received, all, however, hitherto favourable to our most sanguine hopes."

The weather, most fortunately at this interesting and important period, continued remarkably clear; and the ships having reached the longitude of 83° 12', the two shores of the sound were ascertained to be still at least fifty miles asunder, and what was still more encouraging, no land was discerned to the westward. In fact, there seemed no obstacle; none of those mountains with which, according to Captain Ross, the passage of the sound was eternally blocked up, nor even any ice, an object of a less serious and permanent nature. Other circumstances were also encouraging; the whole surface of the sea was completely free from ice, no land was seen in the direction of their course, and no bottom could be reached with one hundred and seventy fathoms of line, so that "we began," observes Captain Parry, "to flatter ourselves that we had fairly entered the Polar Sea, and some of the most sanguine among us had even calculated the bearing and distance of Icy Cape, as a matter of no very difficult or improbable accomplishment. This pleasing prospect was rendered the more flattering, by the sea having, as we thought, regained the usual oceanic colour, and by a long swell which was rolling in from the southward and eastward." The first circumstance that threw a damp over their sanguine expectations, was the discovery of land a-head; they were however renewed by ascertaining that this was only a small island: but though the insurmountable obstacle of a land termination of the sound was thus removed, another appeared in its place; as they perceived that a floe of ice was stretched from the island to the northern shore. On the southern shore, however, a large inlet was discovered, ten leagues broad at its entrance, and as no land could be seen in the line of its direction, hopes were excited that it might lead to a passage into the Polar Sea, freer from ice than the one above described. At this period of the voyage a singular circumstance was remarked: during their passage down Sir James Lancaster's Sound, the compass would scarcely traverse, and the ship's iron evidently had great influence over it: both these phaenomena became more apparent and powerful, in proportion as their westerly course encreased. When they were arrived in the latitude of 73°, the directive power of the needle became so weak, that it was completely overcome by the attraction of the iron in the ship, so that the needle might now be said to point to the north pole of the ship. And by an experiment it was found, that a needle suspended by a thread, the movements of which were of course scarcely affected by any friction, always pointed to the head of the ship, in whatever direction it might be.

To this inlet, which Captain Parry was now sailing down, he gave the name of the Prince Regent. The prospect was still very flattering: the width increased as they proceeded, and the land inclined more and more to the south-westward. But their expectations were again destroyed: a floe of ice stretched to the southward, beyond which no sea was to be descried. Captain Parry therefore resolved to return to the wide westerly passage which he had quitted. On the 22d of August, being in longitude 92-1/4°, they opened two fine channels, the one named after the Duke of Wellington; this was eight leagues in width, and neither land nor ice could be seen from the mast head though the weather was extremely clear; this channel tended to the N.N.W. The other stretched nearly west: and though it was not so open, yet as it was more directly in the course which it was their object to pursue, it was preferred by Captain Parry. By the 25th they had reached 99° west longitude, about 20 degrees beyond Lancaster Sound. On the 30th they made the S.E. point of Melville Island. By the 4th of September they had passed the meridian of 110° west longitude, in latitude 74° 44' 20": this entitled them to the first sum in the scale of rewards granted by parliament, namely 5000 l; as at this part of their course they were opposite a point of land lying in the S.E. of Melville Island; this point was called Bounty Cape. On the 6th of September they anchored, for the first time since they had left England, in a bay, called after the two ships.

During the remainder of the season of 1819, which however contained only twenty more days, in which any thing could be done, Captain Parry prosecuted with much perseverance, and in the midst of infinite difficulties and obstacles, a plan which had suggested itself to him some time before; this was to conduct the ships close to the shore, within the main body of the ice; but their progress was so extremely slow, that, during the remainder of the year they did not advance more than forty miles. On the 21st Captain Parry abandoned the undertaking, and returned to the bay which was called after the two ships. Here they lay ten months; and the arrangements made by Captain Parry for the safety of the vessels, and for the health, comfort, and even the amusement of the crew, were planned and effected with such admirable good sense, that listlessness and fatigue were strangers, even among sailors, a class of men who, above all others, it would have been apprehended, would have soon wearied of such a monotonous life. The commencement of winter was justly dated from the 14th of September, when the thermometer suddenly fell to 9°. On the 4th of November the sun descended below the horizon, and did not appear again till the 8th of February. A little before and after what in other places is called the shortest day, but which to them was the middle of their long night, there was as much light as enabled them to read small print, when held towards the south, and to walk comfortably for two hours. Excessive cold, as indicated by the thermometer, took place in January: it then sunk from 30° to 40° below Zero: on the 11th of this month it was at 49°; yet no disease, or even pain or inconvenience was felt in consequence of this most excessive cold, provided the proper precautions were used; nor did any complaint arise from the extreme and rapid change of temperature to which they were exposed, when, as was often the case, they passed from the cabins, which were kept heated up to 60° or 70°, to the open air, though the change in one minute was in several instances 120° of temperature.

Cold, however, as January was, yet the following month, though, as we have already observed, it again exhibited the sun to them, was much colder; on the 15th of February the thermometer fell to 55° below Zero, and remained for fifteen hours not higher than 54°. Within the next fifteen hours it gradually rose to 34°. But though the sun re-appeared early in February, they had still a long imprisonment to endure; and Captain Parry did not consider it safe to leave their winter quarters till the 1st of August, when they again sailed to the westward: their mode of proceeding was the same as that which they had adopted the preceding year, viz. crawling along the shore, within the fast ice; in this manner they got to the west end of Melville Island. But all their efforts to proceed further were of no avail. Captain Parry was now convinced, that somewhere to the south-west of this there must be an immoveable obstacle, which prevented the ice dispersing in that direction, as it had been found to do in every other part of the voyage.

At last, on the 16th of August, further attempts were given up, and Captain Parry determined to return to the eastward, along the edge of the ice, in order that he might push to the southward if he could find an opening. Such an opening, however, could not be found; but by coasting southward, along the west side of Baffin's Bay, Captain Parry convinced himself that there are other passages into Prince Regent's Inlet, besides that by Lancaster Sound. The farthest point in the Polar sea reached in this voyage was latitude 71° 26' 23", and longitude 113° 46' 43:5". On the 26th of September they took a final leave of the ice, and about the middle of November they arrived in the Thames.

In every point of view this voyage was extremely creditable to Captain Parry; it is not surpassed by any for the admirable manner in which it was conducted, for the presence of mind, perseverance, and skill of all the arrangements and operations. It has also considerably benefited all those branches of science to which the observations and experiments of Captain Ross and his companions were directed, and to which we have already adverted. Perhaps in no one point has it been of more use to mariners, than in proving the minute accuracy of going to which chronometers have been brought.

As this expedition very naturally encouraged the hope that a north-west passage existed, and might be discovered and effected, and as Captain Parry was decidedly of this opinion, government very properly resolved to send him out again; he accordingly sailed in the spring of the year following that of his return. He recommended that the attempt should be made in a more southern latitude, and close along the northern coast of America, as in that direction a better climate might be expected, and a longer season by at least six weeks; and this recommendation, it is supposed, had its weight with the admiralty in the instructions and discretionary powers which they gave him.

We must now direct our attention to the southern polar regions. Geographers and philosophers supposed that in this portion of the globe there must be some continent or very large island, which would serve, as it were, to counterbalance the immense tracts of land which, to the northward, stretched not only as near the pole, as navigation had been able to proceed, but also west and east, the whole breadth of Europe and Asia.

The second voyage of Captain Cook was planned and undertaken for the express purpose of solving the question respecting the Terra Australis which occupied the older maps. He sailed on this voyage in July 1772, having under his command two ships, particularly well adapted and fitted up for such a service, the Resolution and Adventure; he was accompanied by a select band of officers, most of whom were not only skilful and experienced navigators, but also scientific astronomers and geographers; there were also two professed astronomers, two gentlemen who were well skilled in every branch of natural history, and a landscape painter.