troublesome of the whole; for, on endeavouring to pull out the pieces in the manner at first intended, every effort failed, till at length we were reduced to the necessity of cutting each block diagonally before it could be moved from its place.  After a week’s experience, we also learned that much time had been lost in completing the whole of the lateral cuts at once; for these, partly from frost, and partly by the closing together of the sides of the canal, all required sawing a second, and in some places even a third time.  It was surprising, also, to see how powerful a resistance was occasioned by the “sludge” produced in sawing, or, as the sailors called it, the “sawdust,” continuing in the cut, and appearing to act, like oil interposed between two plates of glass, in keeping the masses united.  In some cases, also, a saw was squeezed so tight by the pressure of the ice in the cut, that it became necessary to enter a second in order to release it, by sawing out a circular plug of ice completely round it.  Fatiguing as this work proved to the men, I directed it to be continued to-day, the sea remaining so open on the outside as to give every encouragement to our exertions.

One of our people, in walking over the island, met with a swan’s nest, which Captain Lyon went out to see, and made a drawing of it.  It was built of moss-peat, being no less than five feet ten inches in length, four feet nine inches wide, and two feet deep.  The hole of entrance in the top was eighteen inches wide.  Two eggs, each weighing about eight ounces, were found in the nest, in which the old birds were also sitting at first, but too wild to be approached.  The eggs are of a cream or brownish white colour, in some parts a little clouded by a darker tinge.  The female subsequently laid a third egg, and soon afterward both birds appeared to have wholly deserted the nest.

In the second week our progress with the canal had been considerable, it being now completed within two hundred yards of the Fury’s stern.

At the conclusion of the day’s labour on the 19th, we had every prospect of getting to sea in forty-eight hours more; but, early on the following morning, when the ebb or northeasterly tide had made, and was assisted by a breeze from the southward, the whole body of sea-ice came forcibly in contact with the bay-floe, which was now so weakened by our cutting as to split the whole way from the edge up to the Hecla’s stern, a little to the westward of the canal, the latter being almost immediately closed with a considerable crush, but without affecting the ships which lay beyond it.  The closing of our artificial canal had the effect of partially opening a natural one at the place where the ice had just been detached; but, as this was incomplete, coming gradually up to a point astern of the Hecla, we were at a loss to know on which of the two our labour would best be employed.  An attempt was first made by four strong purchases, stretched