wo we were steaming
at five o'clock in the morning of the 12th of July, and all was
promising--a headland called Cape Walker and Melville Monument opening
fast to view. The quarter-master grinned, as he made his report, that
he was sure we were in what was a fair lead into the North Water!

Hope is not prophecy! and so they will find who labour in the North;
for how changed was the prospect when I went on deck after a short
sleep--a south wind had sprung up. We were under sail. The pack was
coming in fast, and the signal "Prepare to take the ice," flying from
the Commodore's mast-head. We did take it, as the pack came against the
land-floe, with Cape Walker about abreast of us; and, in a few hours,
the "nip" took place. The "Intrepid" and "Pioneer" having gone into a
natural dock together, were secure enough until the projecting points
of the land-floe gave way, when the weight of the pressure came on the
vessels, and then we felt, for the first time, a Melville Bay squeeze.
The vessels, lifted by the floes, shot alternately ahead of one
another, and rode down the floe for some fifty yards, until firmly
imbedded in ice, which, in many layers, formed a perfect cradle under
their bottoms. We, of course, were passive spectators, beyond taking
the precaution to have a few men following the vessels over the ice
with two or three of the boats, in case of a fatal squeeze. The "Sweet
little Cherub" watched over the steamers, however, and, in a short
time, the pressure transferred itself elsewhere. Next day showed all of
Her Majesty's squadron beset in Melville Bay. The gale had abated, but
an immense body of ice had come in from the S.W. To the N.W. a dark
haze showed a water sky, but from it we must have been at least forty
miles. Between us and the shore, a land-floe, of some thirty miles in
width, followed the sinuosities of the coast-line. Bergs here and there
strewed its surface; but the major part of them formed what is called a
"reef," in the neighbourhood of Devil's Thumb, denoting either a bank
or shoal water in that direction.

[Headnote: _NARWHALES._]

A powerful sunlight obliged spectacles of every shade, size, and
description to be brought into use; and, as we walked about from ship
to ship, a great deal of joking and facetiousness arose out of the
droll appearance of some individuals,--utility, and not beauty, was,
however, generally voted the great essential in our bachelor community;
and good looks, by genera