es further to the west, which we reached after receiving several
heavy blows in passing through the loose ice at the entrance of the
strait, between the central reef and the island, where the pieces were
much tossed by the tide.

The view from the south-east part of the island led us, at first, to
suppose that we might proceed by keeping close to its south shore; but
in making the attempt, the boats repeatedly took the ground, and we were
obliged to seek a passage by the north side of the island. At the end of
a mile in that direction we were stopped by the ice being unbroken from
the shore, and closely packed to seaward. Since the day after our
departure from the Mackenzie, when we first came to the ice, we had not
witnessed a more unfavourable prospect than that before us. No water was
to be seen, either from the tents, or from the different points of the
island which we visited, for the purpose of examining into the state of
the ice. We were now scantily supplied with fuel; the drift timber being
covered by the ice high up the bank, except just where the boat had
landed.

[Sidenote: Sunday, 6th.] In the evening a gale came on from the east,
and blew throughout the following day: we vainly hoped this would
produce some favourable change; and the water froze in the kettle on the
night of the 5th. The position of the encampment was ascertained by
observation to be, latitude 70 degrees 11 minutes N.; longitude 145
degrees 50 minutes W.; variation 42 degrees 56 minutes E.; so that
notwithstanding the obstructions we had met, an advance of two degrees
of longitude had been made in the two preceding days.

This island received the name of Flaxman, in honour of the late eminent
sculptor. It is about four miles long and two broad, and rises, at its
highest elevation, about fifty feet. In one of the ravines, where a
portion of the bank had been carried away by the disruption of the ice,
we perceived that the stratum of loose earth was not more than eighteen
inches thick, the lower bed being frozen mud; yet this small quantity of
soil, though very swampy, nourished grasses, several of the arctic
plants, and some few willows, that were about three inches high. Several
boulder stones were scattered on its beach, and also in the channel that
separates it from the main shore.

[Sidenote: Monday, 7th.] An easterly wind gave place to a calm on the
morning of the 7th: and as this change, though it produced no effect in
loosening t