noon
-- This morning we reached the western extremity of the field which had impeded us , and , weathering it , came to an open sea , without a particle of ice . Upon sounding with two hundred fathoms , we here found a current setting southwardly at the rate of half a mile per hour . The temperature of the air was forty-seven , that of the water thirty-four . We now sailed to the southward without meeting any interruption of moment until the sixteenth , when , at noon , we were in latitude 81 degrees 21 ' , longitude 42 degrees W . We here again sounded , and found a current setting still southwardly , and at the rate of three quarters of a mile per hour . The variation per azimuth had diminished , and the temperature of the air was mild and pleasant , the thermometer being as high as fifty-one . At this period not a particle of ice was to be discovered .