those sufferings really were, though he himself had
fared better.

While Franklin had been making his way to the Copper Mine River, Parry
on board the _Fury_, accompanied by the _Hecla_, started for Hudson's
Strait, by which he was to penetrate to the Pacific, if possible. Owing
to bad weather, the expedition did not arrive amid the icebergs till
the middle of June. Towering two hundred feet high, the explorers
counted fifty-four at one time before they arrived at Resolution
Island at the mouth of Hudson Strait. There were already plenty of
well-known landmarks in the region of Hudson's Bay, and Parry soon
made his way to Southampton Island and Frozen Strait (over which an
angry discussion had taken place some hundred years before). He was
rewarded by discovering "a magnificent bay," to which he gave the name
of the "Duke of York's Bay." The discovery, however, was one of little
importance as there was no passage. The winter was fast advancing,
the navigable season was nearly over, and the explorers seemed to be
only at the beginning of their work. The voyage had been dangerous,
harassing, unproductive.

They had advanced towards the Behring Strait; they had discovered two
hundred leagues of North American coast, and they now prepared to spend
the winter in these icebound regions. As usual Parry arranged both
for the health and amusement of his men during the long Arctic
months--even producing a "joint of English roast beef" for Christmas
dinner, preserved "by rubbing the outside with salt and hanging it
on deck covered with canvas." There were also Eskimos in the
neighbourhood, who proved a never-ceasing source of interest.

[Illustration: AN ESKIMO WATCHING A SEAL HOLE. From a drawing in
Parry's _Second Voyage for a North-West Passage_, 1824.]

One day in April--snow had been falling all night, news spread that
the Eskimos "had killed something on the ice." "If the women," says
Parry, "were cheerful before, they were now absolutely frantic. A
general shout of joy re-echoed through the village; they ran into each
others' huts to communicate the welcome intelligence, and actually
hugged one another in an ecstasy of delight. When the first burst of
joy had at last subsided the women crept one by one into the apartment
where the sea-horses had been conveyed. Here they obtained blubber
enough to set all their lamps alight, besides a few scraps of meat
for their children and themselves. Fresh cargoes were continually