them
from the fore part of the ship as they passed under the bows.

On the 12th of December, Henry Fitz-Gerald, a feaman, departed
this life; he was troubled with a disease in his lungs, but the
scurvy was his principal malady.

On the 13th, in the morning, we passed one of the largest
ice-islands we had seen; we judged it not less than three miles
in length, and its perpendicular height we supposed to be 350
feet.

In latitude 51 deg. 33' south, and longitude 321 deg. 00'
east, the wind seemed set in at south-west, and blew a fresh
steady gale, frequently attended with showers of snow or hail;
the variation of the compass decreased fast, as will appear in
the table annexed. On the 16th the wind shifted suddenly to the
north-west quarter, and blew a steady gale. On the 19th, it blew
very strong from west-north-west, with hazy weather, and frequent
showers of rain, which again changed the wind to the south-west
quarter, and the weather, as usual upon those changes, became
fair and pleasant.

We now seemed to have got out from among the ice-islands, with
which, from South Georgia to the latitude of 46 deg. south, this
ocean seems at this season of the year to be overspread. In
latitude 44 deg. 00' south, we saw the last piece of ice, and in
the whole, we had been twenty-eight days among the ice, and
sailed a distance of 800 leagues. We had run for several days
together, at the rate of from 50 to 60 leagues in the 24 hours,
in a north-east direction; and had passed through a lane or
street, if it may be so called, of ice-islands, the whole of that
distance: in general they were from the size of a country church,
to the magnitude of one, two and three miles in circumference,
and proportionably high.

Were it not that at this season of the year we had in such
high latitudes very short nights, and scarcely an hour which
could be called dark; it would certainly be attended with
considerable danger to run in the night, the ice islands were in
such vast numbers; indeed, we seldom sailed more than three or
four miles, without having several upon each beam. I think the
direction, in which those pieces of ice seemed to have been
driven, is a strong proof of the prevalence of south-west winds
in this part of the ocean. It is highly probable that they had
been formed upon the coast of South Georgia and Sandwich Land,
and separated from the ground early in the spring, or probably in
a gale of wind during the winter. Many of