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 deg., 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 deg., 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 deg. 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 deg. west longitude, in latitude 74 deg. 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.

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