On the 1st and 2d of July, we continued to keep close to the edge
of the ice without perceiving any opening in it. Its outer margin
consisted of heavy detached masses, much washed by the sea, and
formed what is technically called "a pack," this name being given
to ice when so closely connected as not to admit the passage of a
ship between the masses. Within the margin of the pack, it
appeared to consist of heavy and extensive floes, having a bright
ice-blink over them; but no clear water could be discovered to the
westward. The birds, which had hitherto been seen since our first
approach to the ice, were fulmar peterels, little auks, looms, and
a few gulls.

On the morning of the 3d the wind blew strong from the eastward,
with a short, breaking sea, and thick, rainy weather, which made
our situation for some hours rather an unpleasant one, the ice
being close under our lee. Fortunately, however, we weathered it
by stretching back a few miles to the southward. In the afternoon
the wind moderated, and we tacked again to the northward, crossing
the Arctic circle at four P.M., in the longitude of 57° 27' W. We
passed at least fifty icebergs in the course of the day, many of
them of large dimensions. Towards midnight, the wind having
shifted to the southwest and moderated, another extensive chain of
very large icebergs appeared to the northward: as we approached
them the wind died away, and the ships' heads were kept to the
northward, only by the steerage way given to them by a heavy
southerly swell, which, dashing the loose ice with tremendous
force against the bergs, sometimes raised a white spray over the
latter to the height of more than one hundred feet, and, being
accompanied with a loud noise, exactly resembling the roar of