From six A.M. till six P.M. on the 17th, the thermometer stood generally from 55° to 60°; the latter temperature being the highest which appears in the Hecla's Meteorological Journal during this summer. It will readily be conceived how pleasant such a temperature must have been to our feelings after the severe winter which immediately preceded it. The month of July is, indeed, the only one which can be called at all comfortable in the climate of Melville Island.
On the 20th, there being a strong breeze from the N.N.E., with fog and rain, all favourable to the dispersion of the ice, that part of it which was immediately around the Hecla, and from which she had been artificially detached so long before, at length separated into pieces and floated away, carrying with it the collection of ashes and other rubbish which had been accumulating for the last ten months: so that the ship was now once more fairly riding at anchor, but with the ice still occupying the whole of the centre of the harbour, and within a few yards of her bows: the Griper had been set free in a similar manner a few days before. But it was only in that part of the harbour where the ships were lying that the ice had yet separated in this manner at so great a distance from the shore; a circumstance probably occasioned by the greater radiation of heat from the ships, and from the materials of various kinds which we had occasion to deposite upon the ice during the time of our equipment.
Lieutenant Liddon accompanied me in a boat down the west shore of the harbour to the southern point of the entrance, in order to sound along the edge of the ice, where we found from seven to fifteen feet water; the ice about the entrance appeared still very solid and compact, and not a single hole was at this time noticed through any of the pools upon its surface except one, which was made by a seal, and which discovered the thickness of the ice to be there between two and three feet.
There was a fresh breeze from the northeastward, with fine clear weather, on the 22d, which made the Hecla swing round into twenty feet water astern; and the ice, being now moveable in the harbour, came home towards the shore with this wind, but not so much as to put any considerable strain on the cable of either ship; and the holding-ground being excellent, there was nothing to apprehend for their security.
A fresh gale, which blew from the northward on the morning of the 23d, caused a great alteration in the appearance of the ice near the ships, but none whatever in that in the offing or at the mouth of the harbour, except that the shores were there more encumbered than before, owing to the quantity of pieces which were separated and driven down from the northward, so that our small boat could not succeed in getting along the shore.
On the 24th the sails were bent, in readiness for starting at a moment's notice, though it must be confessed that the motive for doing so was to make some show of moving rather than any expectation which I dared to entertain of soon escaping from our long and tedious confinement; for it was impossible to conceal from the men the painful fact that, in eight or nine weeks from this period, the navigable season must unavoidably come to a conclusion.
I went away in a boat early on the morning of the 25th, in order to sound the harbour in those parts where the ice would admit the boat, with a view to take advantage of the first favourable change which might present itself. The wind having come round to the southward in the afternoon, caused the separation of a large portion of ice on the northern side of that which now occupied the harbour, and the detached pieces drifting down towards us, rendered it necessary to be on our guard, lest the ships should be forced from their anchorage. On this account, as well as from an anxious and impatient desire to make a move, however trifling, from a spot in which we had now unwillingly, but unavoidably, passed nearly ten months, and of which we had long been heartily tired, I directed lines to be run out for the purpose of warping the ships along the ice in the centre of the harbour, and at half past two P.M. the anchors were weighed. As soon as a strain was put upon the lines, however, we found that the ice to which they were attached came home upon us, instead of the ships being drawn out to the southward; and we were therefore obliged to have recourse to the kedge-anchors, which we could scarcely find room to drop on account of the closeness of the ice. Having warped a little way out from the shore, into five fathoms and a half, it was found impossible to proceed any farther without a change of wind, and the anchors were therefore dropped till such a change should take place. In the course of the evening all the loose ice drifted past us to the northward, loading that shore of the harbour with innumerable fragments of it, and leaving a considerable space of clear water along shore to the southward.
On the morning of the 26th it was nearly calm, with continued rain and thick weather; and there being now a space of clear water for nearly three quarters of a mile to the southward of us, we took advantage of a breeze which sprung up from the northward to weigh, at nine A.M., and run down as far as the ice would permit, and then dropped our anchors in the best berths we could select, close to the edge of it, with the intention of advancing step by step, as it continued to separate by piecemeal. The ice across the entrance of the harbour as far as this spot, and the whole of that in the offing, of which we had here a commanding view from the Hecla's crow's-nest, was still quite continuous and unbroken, with the same appearance of solidity as it had during the middle of winter, except that the pools of water were numerous upon its surface.
The wind being from the S.S.W. during the night of the 30th, served to close the lane of water which had appeared in the offing the preceding day, which we considered a favourable circumstance, as showing that the external mass of ice was in motion. In the course of the day, the wind shifting to the W.N.W., we once more discovered a small opening between the old and young floes, and at eleven P.M., the whole body of the ice in the harbour was perceived to be moving slowly out to the southeastward, breaking away, for the first time, at the points which form the entrance of the harbour. This sudden and unexpected change rendering it probable that we should at length be released, I sent to Captain Sabine, who had been desirous of continuing his observations on the pendulum to the last moment, to request that he would have the clocks ready for embarcation at an early hour in the morning.
Leave Winter Harbour.—Flattering Appearance of the Sea to the Westward.—Stopped by the Ice near Cape Hay.—Farther Progress to the Longitude of 113° 48' 22.5", being the Westernmost Meridian hitherto reached in the Polar Sea, to the North of America.—Banks's Land discovered.—Increased Extent and Dimensions of the Ice.—Return to the Eastward, to endeavour to penetrate the Ice to the Southward.—Re-enter Barrow's Strait, and Survey its South Coast.—Pass through Sir James Lancaster's Sound on our Return to England.
The wind still blowing fresh from the northward and westward, the ice continued to drift out slowly from the harbour, till, at eight A.M., August 1st, it had left the whole space between the ships and Cape Hearne completely clear, and at eleven o'clock there appeared to be water round the hummocks of ice which lie aground off that point. In the mean time, our boats were employed in embarking the clocks, tents, and observatory, while I sounded the entrance of the harbour in order to complete the survey, which no opportunity had offered of doing before this time. At one P.M., having got everything on board, and the ice appearing to be still leaving the shore, we weighed, and ran out of Winter Harbour, in which we had actually, as had been predicted, passed ten whole months, and a part of the two remaining ones, September and August.
In running along shore towards Cape Hearne, generally at the distance of half a mile from the land, we had from ten to sixteen fathoms' water, and rounded the hummocks off the point in six and a half fathoms by three P.M. As we opened the point, it was pleasing to see that the coast to the westward of it was more clear of ice (excepting the loose pieces which lay scattered about in every direction, but which would not very materially have impeded the navigation with a fair wind) than it had been when we first arrived off it, a month later in the foregoing year; the main ice having been blown off by the late westerly and northwesterly winds to the distance of four or five miles from the shore, which, from all we have seen on this part of the coast, appears to be its utmost limit. The navigable channel, with a beating wind between the ice and the land, was here from one to two, or two miles and a half in width; and this seemed, from the masthead, to continue as far as the eye could reach along shore to the westward.
We found the wind much more westerly after we rounded the point, which made our progress slow and tedious; the more so, as we had every minute to luff for one piece of ice and to bear up for another, by which much ground was unavoidably lost.
After a very few tacks, we had the mortification to perceive that the Griper sailed and worked much worse than before, notwithstanding every endeavour which Lieutenant Liddon had been anxiously making, during her re-equipment, to improve those qualities in which she had been found deficient. She missed stays several times in the course of the evening, with smooth water and a fine working breeze, and by midnight the Hecla had gained eight miles to windward of her, which obliged me to heave to, notwithstanding the increased width of the navigable channel, the weather having become hazy, so as to endanger our parting company.
Soon after noon on the 2d, a breeze sprung up from the S.S.W., which, being rather upon the shore, made it likely that the ice would soon begin to close it; we therefore began to look out for a situation where the ships might be secured in-shore, behind some of the heavy grounded ice which had so often before afforded us shelter under similar circumstances. At one o'clock we perceived that a heavy floe had already closed completely in with the land, at a point a little to the westward of us, preventing all hope of farther progress for the present in that direction. A boat was therefore sent to examine the ice in-shore, and a favourable place having been found for our purpose, the ships were hauled in and secured there, the Griper's bow resting on the beach, in order to allow the Hecla to lie in security without her. This place was so completely sheltered from the access of the main body of the ice, that I began to think seriously of taking advantage of this situation to remove the Griper's crew on board the Hecla, in order to prosecute the voyage in the latter vessel singly, and had consulted the officers upon the subject. The circumstances, however, which subsequently occurred rendering such a measure inexpedient, because no longer necessary to the accomplishment of the object in view, by which alone it could be justified, I was induced to give it up, adopting the best means in our power to remedy the evil in question.
Shortly after our anchoring the Griper's people heard the growling of a bear among the ice near them, but the animal did not appear; and this was the only instance of our meeting with a bear during our stay at Melville Island, except that which followed one of our men to the ships soon after our arrival in Winter Harbour. Both crews were sent on shore to pick sorrel, which was here not less abundant than at our old quarters, but it was now almost too old to be palatable, having nearly lost its acidity and juice.
At one A.M. on the 4th, the loose ice was observed to be drifting in upon us, the wind having veered to the eastward of north; and soon after a floe, of not less than five miles in length and a mile and a half across, was found to be approaching the shore at a quick rate. The ships were immediately hauled as near the shore as possible, and preparation made for unshipping the rudders, if necessary. The floe was brought up, however, by the masses of ice aground outside of us, with which it successively came in contact, and the ships remained in perfect security; the floe, as usual after the first violence is over, moved off again to a little distance from the shore.
At noon the heavy floe at the point near us began to quit the land, and at half past one P.M., there being a narrow passage between them, the breadth of which the breeze was constantly increasing, we cast off and stretched to the westward. The channel which opened to us as we proceeded varied in its general breadth from one to two miles; in some places it was not more than half a mile. The wind was variable and squally, but we made great progress, along the land to the S.W.b.W., and the Griper, by keeping up tolerably with the Hecla, in some measure redeemed her character with us. Having arrived off Cape Providence at eleven P.M., the wind became light and baffling, so that we had just got far enough to see that there was a free and open channel beyond the westernmost point visible of Melville Island, when our progress was almost entirely stopped for want of a breeze to enable us to take advantage of it. The anxiety which such a detention occasions in a sea where, without any apparent cause, the ice frequently closes the shore in the most sudden manner, can perhaps only be conceived by those who have experienced it. We remarked, in sailing near the ice this evening, while the wind was blowing a fresh breeze off the land, and therefore directly towards the ice, that it remained constantly calm within three or four hundred yards of the latter; this effect I do not remember to have observed before upon the windward side of any collection of ice, though it invariably happens, in a remarkable degree, to leeward of it. I may here mention, as a striking proof of the accuracy with which astronomical bearings of objects may be taken for marine surveys, that the relative bearing of Capes Providence and Hay, as obtained this evening when the two headlands were opening, differed only one minute from that entered in the surveying-book, and found in the same manner the preceding year.
At one P.M. on the 5th, the weather continuing quite calm, and being desirous of examining the ice in-shore, that we might be ready for the floes closing upon us, I left the ship, accompanied by Captain Sabine and Mr. Edwards, and landed near one of the numerous deep and broad ravines with which the whole of this part of the island is indented. We were ascending the hill, which was found by trigonometrical measurement to be eight hundred and forty-seven feet above the level of the sea, and on which we found no mineral production but sandstone and clay iron-stone, when a breeze sprung up from the eastward, bringing up the Griper, which had been left several miles astern. We only stopped, therefore, to obtain observations for the longitude and the variation of the magnetic needle; the former of which was 112° 53' 32", and the latter 110° 56' 11" easterly, and then immediately returned on board and made all sail to the westward. After running for two hours without obstruction, we were once more mortified in perceiving that the ice, in very extensive and unusually heavy floes, closed in with the land a little to the westward of Cape Hay, and our channel of clear water between the ice and the land gradually diminished in breadth, till at length it became necessary to take in the studding sails, and to haul to the wind to look about us. I immediately left the ship, and went in a boat to examine the grounded ice off a small point of land, such as always occurs on this coast at the outlet of each ravine. I found that this point offered the only possible shelter which could be obtained in case of the ice coming in; and I therefore determined to take the Hecla in-shore immediately, and to pick out the best berth which circumstances would admit. As I was returning on board with this intention, I found that the ice was already rapidly approaching the shore; no time was to be lost, therefore, in getting the Hecla to her intended station, which was effected by half past eight P.M., being in nine to seven fathoms water, at the distance of twenty yards from the beach, which was lined all round the point with very heavy masses of ice that had been forced by some tremendous pressure into the ground. Our situation was a dangerous one, having no shelter from ice coming from the westward, the whole of which, being distant from us less than half a mile, was composed of floes infinitely more heavy than any we had elsewhere met with during the voyage. The Griper was three or four miles astern of us at the time when the ice began to close, and I therefore directed Lieutenant Liddon, by signal, to secure his ship in the best manner he could, without attempting to join the Hecla; he accordingly made her fast at eleven P.M., near a point like that at which we were lying, and two or three miles to the eastward.
On the whole of this steep coast, wherever we approached the shore, we found a thick stratum of blue and solid ice, firmly imbedded in the beach, at the depth of from six to ten feet under the surface of the water. This ice has probably been the lower part of heavy masses forced aground by the pressure of the floes from without, and still adhering to the viscous mud of which the beach is composed, after the upper part has, in course of time, dissolved. From the tops of the hills in this part of Melville Island a continuous line of this submarine ice could be distinctly traced for miles along the coast.
In running along the shore this evening we had noticed near the sea what at a distance had every appearance of a high wall artificially built, which was the resort of numerous birds. Captain Sabine being desirous to examine it, as well as to procure some specimens of the birds, set out, as soon as we anchored, for that purpose. The wall proved to be composed of sandstone in horizontal strata, from twenty to thirty feet in height, which had been left standing, so as to exhibit its present artificial appearance, by the decomposition of the rock and earth about it. Large flocks of glaucous gulls had chosen this as a secure retreat from the foxes, and every other enemy but man; and when our people first went into the ravine in which it stands, they were so fierce in defence of their young that it was scarcely safe to approach them till a few shots had been fired.
On the morning of the 7th a black whale came up close to the Hecla, being the first we had seen since the 22d of August the preceding year, about the longitude of 91¾° W.; it therefore acquired among us the distinctive appellation ofthewhale. Since leaving Winter Harbour we had also, on two or three occasions, seen a solitary seal. The wind continued fresh from the east and E.N.E. in the morning, and the loose ice came close in upon us, but the main body remained stationary at the distance of nearly half a mile.
In the afternoon a man from each mess was sent on shore to pick sorrel, which was here remarkably fine and large, as well as more acid than any we had lately met with. The shelter from the northerly winds afforded by the high land on this part of the coast, together with its southern aspect, renders the vegetation here immediately next the sea much more luxuriant than in most parts of Melville Island which we visited, and a considerable addition was made to our collection of plants.
The easterly breeze died away in the course of the day, and at three P.M. was succeeded by a light air from the opposite quarter; and as this freshened up a little, the loose ice began to drift into our bight, and that on the eastern side of the point to drive off. It became expedient, therefore, immediately to shift the ship round the point, where she was made fast in four fathoms abaft and seventeen feet forward, close alongside the usual ledge of submarine ice, which touched her about seven feet under water, and which, having few of the heavy masses aground upon it, would probably have allowed her to be pushed over it had a heavy pressure occurred from without. It was the more necessary to moor the ship in some such situation, as we found from six to seven fathoms water by dropping the hand-lead down close to her bow and quarter on the outer side.
Several heavy pieces of floes drove close past us, not less than ten or fifteen feet in thickness, but they were fortunately stopped by a point of land without coming in upon us. At eleven o'clock, however, a mass of this kind, being about half an acre in extent, drove in, and gave the ship a considerable "nip" between it and the land ice, and then grazed past her to the westward. I now directed the rudder to be unhung, and the ship to be swung with her head to the eastward, so that the bow, being the strongest part, might receive the first and heaviest pressure.
The ice did not disturb us again till five A.M. on the 8th, when another floe-piece came in and gave the ship a heavy rub, and then went past, after which it continued slack about us for several hours. Everything was so quiet at nine o'clock as to induce me to venture up the hill abreast of us, in order to have a view of the newly-discovered land to the southwest, which, indeed, I had seen indistinctly and much refracted from the Hecla's deck in the morning. This land, which extends beyond the 117th degree of west longitude, and is the most western yet discovered in the Polar Sea to the northward of the American Continent, was honoured with the name of BANKS'S LAND, out of respect to the late venerable and worthy president of the Royal Society.
On the morning of the 9th a musk-ox came down to graze on the beach near the ships. A party was despatched in pursuit, and, having hemmed him in under the hill, which was too steep for him to ascend, succeeded in killing him. When first brought on board, the inside of this animal, which was a male, smelled very strong of musk, of which the whole of the meat also tasted more or less, and especially the heart. It furnished us with four hundred and twenty-one pounds of beef, which was served to the crews as usual, in lieu of their salt provisions, and was very much relished by us, notwithstanding the peculiarity of its flavour.[*] The meat was remarkably fat, and, as it hung up in quarters, looked as fine as any beef in an English market. A small seal, killed by the Griper's people, was also eaten by them; and it was generally allowed to be very tender and palatable, though not very sightly in its appearance, being of a disagreeable red colour.
[Footnote: Some pieces of this meat which we brought to England were found to have acquired a much more disagreeable flavour than when first killed, though they had not undergone putrefaction in the slightest degree.]
At ten P.M. the whole body of ice, which was then a quarter of a mile from us, was found to be drifting in upon the land, and the ship was warped back a little way to the westward, towards that part of the shore which was most favourable for allowing her to be forced up on the beach. At eleven o'clock, the piece of a floe which came near us in the afternoon, and which had since drifted back a few hundred yards to the eastward, received the pressure of the whole body of ice as it came in. It split across in various directions with a considerable crash, and presently after we saw a part, several hundred tons in weight, raised slowly and majestically, as if by the application of a screw, and deposited on another part of the floe from which it had broken, presenting towards us the surface that had split, which was of a fine blue colour, and very solid and transparent. The violence with which the ice was coming in being thus broken, it remained quiet during the night, which was calm, with a heavy fall of snow.
The mass of ice which had been lifted up the preceding day being drifted close to us on the morning of the 10th, I sent Lieutenant Beechey to measure its thickness, which proved to be forty-two feet; and as it was a piece of a regular floe, this measurement may serve to give some idea of the general thickness of the ice in this neighbourhood.
I began to consider whether it would not be advisable, whenever the ice would allow us to move, to sacrifice a few miles of the westing we had already made, and to run along the margin of the floes, in order to endeavour to find an opening leading to the southward, by taking advantage of which we might be enabled to prosecute the voyage to the westward in a lower latitude. I was the more inclined to make this attempt, from its having long become evident to us that the navigation of this part of the Polar Sea is only to be performed by watching the occasional openings between the ice and the shore; and that, therefore, a continuity of land is essential, if not absolutely necessary, for this purpose. Such a continuity of land, which was here about to fail us, must necessarily be furnished by the northern coast of America, in whatsoever latitude it may be found; and, as a large portion of our short season had already been occupied in fruitless attempts to penetrate farther to the westward in our present parallel, under circumstances of more than ordinary risk to the ships, I determined, whenever the ice should open sufficiently, to put into execution the plan I had proposed.
At seven P.M. we shipped the rudder and crossed the top-gallant yards in readiness for moving; and then I ascended the hill and walked a mile to the westward, along the brow of it, that not a moment might be lost after the ice to the westward should give us the slightest hope of making any progress by getting under way. Although the holes had certainly increased in size and extent, there was still not sufficient room even for one of our boats to work to windward; and the impossibility of the ships' doing so was rendered more apparent, on account of the current which, as I have before had occasion to remark, is always produced in these seas soon after the springing up of a breeze, and which was now running to the eastward at the rate of at least one mile per hour. It was evident that any attempt to get the ships to the westward must, under circumstances so unfavourable, be attended with the certain consequence of their being drifted the contrary way; and nothing could therefore be done but still to watch, which we did most anxiously, every alteration in the state of the ice. The wind, however, decreasing as the night came on, served to diminish the hopes with which we had flattered ourselves of being speedily extricated from our present confined and dangerous situation.
The weather was foggy for some hours in the morning of the 11th, but cleared up in the afternoon as the sun acquired power. The wind increased to a fresh gale from the eastward at nine P.M., being the second time that it had done so while we had been lying at this station; a circumstance which we were the more inclined to notice, as the easterly winds had hitherto been more faint and less frequent than those from the westward. In this respect, therefore, we considered ourselves unfortunate, as experience had already shown us that none but a westerly wind ever produced upon this coast, or, indeed, on the southern coast of any of the North Georgian Islands, the desired effect of clearing the shores of ice.
The gale continued strong during the night, and the ice quite stationary. Not a pool of clear water could be seen in any direction, except just under the lee of our point, where there was a space large enough to contain half a dozen sail of ships, till about noon, when the whole closed in upon us without any apparent cause, except that the wind blew in irregular puffs about that time, and at one P.M. it was alongside. The ship was placed in the most advantageous manner for taking the beach, or, rather, the shelf of submarine ice, and the rudder again unshipped and hung across the stem. The ice which came in contact with the ship's side consisted of very heavy loose pieces, drawing twelve or fourteen feet water, which, however, we considered as good "fenders," compared with the enormous fields which covered the sea just without them. Everything remained quiet for the rest of the day, without producing any pressure of consequence; the wind came round to N.b.E. at night, but without moving the ice off the land.
Early in the morning of the 13th I received by Mr. Griffiths a message from Lieutenant Liddon, acquainting me that, at eleven o'clock on the preceding night, the ice had been setting slowly to the westward, and had, at the same time, closed in upon the land where the Griper was lying, by which means she was forced against the submarine ice, and her stern lifted two feet out of the water. This pressure, Lieutenant Liddon remarked, had given her a twist, which made her crack a good deal, but apparently without suffering any material injury in her hull, though the ice was still pressing upon her when Mr. Griffiths came away. She had at first heeled inward, but, on being lifted higher, fell over towards the deep water. Under these circumstances Lieutenant Liddon had very properly landed all the journals and other documents of importance, and made every arrangement in his power for saving the provisions and stores in case of shipwreck, which he had now every reason to anticipate. Convinced as I was that no human art or power could, in our present situation, prevent such a catastrophe whenever the pressure of the ice became sufficient, I was more than ever satisfied with the determination to which I had previously come, of keeping the ships apart during the continuance of these untoward circumstances, in order to increase the chance of saving one of them from accidents of this nature. In the mean time the ice remained so close about the Hecla, that the slightest pressure producing in it a motion towards the shore must have placed us in a situation similar to that of the Griper; and our attention was therefore diverted to the more important object of providing, by every means in our power, for the security of the larger ship, as being the principal depôt of provisions and other resources.
At five P.M. Lieutenant Liddon acquainted me by letter that the Griper had at length righted, the ice having slackened a little around her, and that all the damage she appeared to have sustained was in her rudder, which was badly split, and would require some hours' labour to repair it whenever the ice should allow him to get it on shore.
Soon after midnight the ice pressed closer in upon the Hecla than before, giving her a heel of eighteen inches towards the shore, but without appearing to strain her in the slightest degree. By four P.M. the pressure had gradually decreased, and the ship had only three or four inches heel; in an hour after she had perfectly righted, and the ice remained quiet for the rest of the day.
Every moment's additional detention now served to confirm me in the opinion I had formed as to the expediency of trying, at all risks, to penetrate to the southward whenever the ice would allow us to move at all, rather than persevere any longer in the attempts we had been lately making, with so little success, to push on directly to the westward. I therefore gave Lieutenant Liddon an order to run back a certain distance to the eastward whenever he could do so, without waiting for the Hecla, should that ship be still detained; and to look out for any opening in the ice to the southward which might seem likely to favour the object I had in view, waiting for me to join him should any such opening occur.
The breeze died away in the course of the night, just as the ice was beginning to separate and to drift away from the shore; and, being succeeded by a wind off the land, which is here very unusual, Lieutenant Liddon was enabled to sail upon the Griper at two A.M. on the 15th, in execution of the orders I had given him. As I soon perceived, however, that she made little or no way, the wind drawing more to the eastward on that part of the coast, and as the clear water was increasing along the shore to the westward much farther than we had yet seen it, I made the signal of recall to the Griper, with the intention of making another attempt, which the present favourable appearances seemed to justify, to push forward without delay in the desired direction. At five A.M., therefore, as soon as the snow had cleared away sufficiently to allow the signal to be distinguished, we cast off and ran along shore, the wind having by this time veered to the E.b.N., and blowing in strong puffs out of the ravines as we passed them. We sailed along, generally at the distance of a hundred or a hundred and fifty yards from the beach, our soundings being from ten to seventeen fathoms; and, after running a mile and a half in a N.W.b.W. direction, once more found the ice offering an impenetrable obstacle to our progress westward, at a small projecting point of land just beyond us. We therefore hauled the ship into a berth which we were at this moment fortunate in finding abreast of us, and where we were enabled to place the Hecla within a number of heavy masses of grounded ice, such as do not often occur on this steep coast, which, compared with the situation we had lately left, appeared a perfect harbour. In the mean time, the wind had failed our consort when she was a mile and a half short of this place; and Lieutenant Liddon, after endeavouring in vain to warp up to us, was obliged, by the ice suddenly closing upon him, to place her in-shore, in the first situation he could find, which proved to be in very deep water, as well as otherwise so insecure as not to admit a hope of saving the ship should the ice continue to press upon her.
Mr. Fisher found very good sport in our new station, having returned in the evening, after a few hours' excursion, with nine hares; the birds had, of late, almost entirely deserted us, a flock or two of ptarmigan and snow-buntings, a few glaucous gulls, a raven, and an owl, being all that had been met with for several days.
A fog, which had prevailed during the night, cleared away in the morning of the 16th, and a very fine day succeeded, with a moderate breeze from the westward. In order to have a clear and distinct view of the state of the ice, after twenty-four hours' wind from that quarter, Captain Sabine, Mr. Edwards, and myself, walked about two miles to the westward, along the high part of the land next the sea, from whence it appeared but too evident that no passage in this direction was yet to be expected. The ice to the west and southwest was as solid and compact, to all appearance, as so much land; to which, indeed, the surface of so many fields, from the kind of hill and dale I have before endeavoured to describe, bore no imperfect resemblance. I have no doubt that, had it been our object to circumnavigate Melville Island, or, on the other hand, had the coast continued its westerly direction instead of turning to the northward, we should still have contrived to proceed a little occasionally, as opportunities offered, notwithstanding the increased obstruction which here presented itself; but, as neither of these was the case, there seemed little or nothing to hope for from any farther attempts to prosecute the main object of the voyage in this place. I determined, therefore, no longer to delay the execution of my former intentions, and to make trial, if possible, of a more southern latitude, in which I might follow up the success that had hitherto attended our exertions.
The station at which the ships were now lying, and which is the westernmost point to which the navigation of the Polar Sea to the northward of the American Continent has yet been carried, is in latitude 74° 26' 25", and longitude, by chronometer, 113° 46' 43.5".
The place where the Hecla was now secured, being the only one of the kind which could be found, was a little harbour, formed, as usual, by the grounded ice, some of which was fixed to the bottom in ten to twelve fathoms. One side of the entrance to this harbour consisted of masses of floes, very regular in their shape, placed quite horizontally, and broken off so exactly perpendicular as to resemble a handsome, well-built wharf. On the opposite side, however, the masses to which we looked for security were themselves rather terrific objects, as they leaned over so much towards the ship as to give the appearance of their being in the act of falling upon her deck; and as a very trifling concussion often produces the fall of much heavier masses of ice, when in appearance very firmly fixed to the ground, I gave orders that no guns should be fired near the ship during her continuance in this situation. The Griper was of necessity made fast near the beach in rather an exposed situation, and her rudder unshipped, in readiness for the ice coming in; it remained quiet, however, though quite close, during the day, the weather being calm and fine.
It was again nearly calm on the 19th, and the weather was foggy for some hours in the morning. In the evening, having walked to Cape Providence to see if there was any possibility of moving the ships, I found the ice so close that a boat could not have passed beyond the Cape; but a light air drifting the ice slowly to the eastward at this time, gave me some hopes of soon being enabled to make our escape from this tedious as well as vexatious confinement. At a quarter past eight it was high water by the shore; about this time the ice ceased driving to the eastward, and shortly after returned in the opposite direction.
At half past eleven P.M., some heavy pieces of the grounded ice, to which our bow-hawser was secured, fell off into the water, snapping the rope in two without injuring the ship. As, however, every alteration of this kind must materially change the centre of gravity of the whole mass, which already appeared in a tottering state, I thought it prudent to move the Hecla out of her harbour to the place where the Griper was lying, considering that a ship might easily be forced on shore by the ice without suffering any serious damage; but that one of those enormous masses falling upon her deck must inevitably crush or sink her.
The "young ice" had increased to the thickness of an inch and a half on the morning of the 23d, and some snow which had fallen in the night served to cement the whole more firmly together. On a breeze springing up from the westward, however, it soon began to acquire a motion to leeward, and at half an hour before noon had slackened about the ships sufficiently to allow us to warp them out, which was accordingly done, and all sail made upon them. The wind having freshened up from the W.N.W., the ships' heads were got the right way, and, by great attention to the sails, kept so till they had got abreast of Cape Providence, after which they were no longer manageable, the ice being more close than before. I have before remarked that the loose ice in this neighbourhood was heavy in proportion to the floes from which it had been broken; and the impossibility of sailing among such ice, most of which drew more water than the Hecla, and could not, therefore, be turned by her weight, was this day rendered very apparent, the ships having received by far the heaviest shocks which they experienced during the voyage. They continued, however, to drive till they were about three miles to the eastward of Cape Providence, where the low land commences; when, finding that there was not any appearance of open water to the eastward or southward, and that we were now incurring the risk of being beset at sea, without a chance of making any farther progress, we hauled in for the largest piece of grounded ice we could see upon the beach, which we reached at six P.M., having performed six miles of the most difficult navigation I have ever known among ice. The Hecla was made fast in from eighteen to twenty feet water close to the beach, and the Griper in four fathoms, about half a mile to the westward of us.
The situation in which the ships were now placed, when viewed in combination with the shortness of the remaining part of the season, and the period to which our resources of every kind could be extended, was such as to require a more than ordinary consideration, in order to determine upon the measures most proper to be pursued for the advancement of the public service, and the security of the ships and people committed to my charge. Judging from the close of the summer of 1819, it was reasonable to consider the 7th of September as the limit beyond which the navigation of this part of the Polar Sea could not be performed, with tolerable safety to the ships or with any hope of farther success. Impressed, however, with a strong sense of the efforts which it became us to make in the prosecution of our enterprise, I was induced to extend this limit to the 14th of September, before which day, on the preceding year, the winter might fairly be said to have set in. But even with this extension our prospect was not very encouraging: the direct distance to Icy Cape was between eight and nine hundred miles, while that which we had advanced towards it this season fell short of sixty miles.
By Mr. Hooper's report of the remains of provisions, it appeared that, at the present reduced allowance (namely, two thirds of the established proportion of the navy), they would last until the 30th of November, 1821; and that an immediate reduction, to half allowance, which must, however, tend materially to impair the health and vigour of the officers and men, would only extend our resources to the 30th of April, 1822; it therefore became a matter of evident and imperious necessity, that the ships should be cleared from the ice before the close of the season of 1821, so as to reach some station where supplies might be obtained by the end of that, or early in the following year.
By the same report, it appeared that the fuel with which we were furnished could only be made to extend to a period of two years and seven months, or to the end of November, 1821; and this only by resorting to the unhealthy measure of both crews living on board the Hecla during six of the ensuing winter months.
The ships might be considered almost as effective as when the expedition left England; the wear and tear having been trifling, and the quantity of stores remaining on board being amply sufficient, in all probability, for a much longer period than the provisions and fuel. The health of the officers and men continued also as good, or nearly so, as at the commencement of the voyage. Considering, however, the serious loss we had sustained in the lemon-juice, the only effectual antiscorbutic on which we could depend during at least nine months of the year in these regions, as well as the effects likely to result from crowding nearly one hundred persons into the accommodation intended only for fifty-eight, whereby the difficulty of keeping the inhabited parts of the ship in a dry and wholesome state would have been so much increased, there certainly seemed some reason to apprehend that a second winter would not leave us in possession of the same excellent health which we now happily enjoyed, while it is possible that the difficulty and danger of either proceeding or returning might have been increased.
A herd of musk-oxen being seen at a little distance from the ships, a party was despatched in pursuit; and Messrs. Fisher and Bushnan were fortunate in killing a fine bull, which separated from the rest of the herd, being too unwieldy to make such good way as the others. He was, however, by no means caught by our people in fair chase; for, though these animals run with a hobbling sort of canter, that makes them appear as if every now and then about to fall, yet the slowest of them can far outstrip a man. In this herd were two calves, much whiter than the rest, the older ones having only the white saddle. In the evening, Sergeant Martin succeeded in killing another bull; these two animals afforded a very welcome supply of fresh meat, the first giving us three hundred and sixty-nine, and the other three hundred and fifty-two pounds of beef, which was served in the same manner as before.[*]
[Footnote: The total quantity of game obtained for the use of the expedition during our stay upon the shores of Melville Island, being a period of nearly twelve months, was as follows: 3 musk oxen, 24 deer, 68 hares, 53 geese, 59 ducks, 144 ptarmigans: affording 3766 pounds of meat.]
It was gratifying to me to find that the officers unanimously agreed with me in opinion that any farther attempt to penetrate to the westward in our present parallel would be altogether fruitless, and attended with a considerable loss of time, which might be more usefully employed. They also agreed with me in thinking that the plan which I had adopted, of running back along the edge of the ice to the eastward, in order to look out for an opening that might lead us towards the American Continent, was in every respect the most advisable; and that, in the event of failing to find any such opening after a reasonable time spent in search, it would be expedient to return to England rather than risk the passing another winter in these seas, without the prospect of attaining any adequate object; namely, that of being able to start from an advanced station at the commencement of the following season.
At three P.M. we were abreast of Cape Hearne; and, as we opened the bay of the Hecla and Griper, the wind, as usual on this part of the coast, came directly out from the northward; but, as soon as we had stretched over to Bounty Cape, of which we were abreast at eight P.M., it drew once more along the land from the westward. The distance between the ice and the land increased as we proceeded, and at midnight the channel appeared to be four or five miles wide, as far as the darkness of the night would allow of our judging; for we could at this period scarcely see to read in the cabin at ten o'clock. The snow which fell during the day was observed, for the first time, to remain upon the land without dissolving; thus affording a proof of the temperature of the earth's surface having again fallen below that of freezing, and giving notice of the near approach of another long and dreary winter.
At seven P.M., a fog coming on, we hauled up close to the edge of the ice, both as a guide to us in sailing during the continuance of the thick weather, and to avoid passing any opening that might occur in it to the southward. We were, in the course of the evening, within four or five miles of the same spot where we had been on the same day and at the same hour the preceding year; and, by a coincidence perhaps still more remarkable, we were here once more reduced to the same necessity as before, of steering the ships by one another for an hour or two; the Griper keeping the Hecla ahead, and our quartermaster being directed to keep the Griper right astern, for want of some better mode of knowing in what direction we were running. The fog froze hard as it fell upon the rigging, making it difficult to handle the ropes in working the ship, and the night was rather dark for three or four hours.
At a quarter past three on the morning of the 30th, we bore up to the eastward, the wind continuing fresh directly down Barrow's Strait, except just after passing Prince Leopold's Islands, where it drew into Prince Regent's Inlet, and, as soon as we had passed this, again assumed its former westerly direction; affording a remarkable instance of the manner in which the wind is acted upon by the particular position of the land, even at a considerable distance from it. The islands were encumbered with ice to the distance of four or five miles all found them, but the Strait was generally as clear and navigable as any part of the Atlantic.
Having now traced the ice the whole way from the longitude of 114° to that of 90°, without discovering any opening to encourage a hope of penetrating it to the southward, I could not entertain the slightest doubt that there no longer remained a possibility of effecting our object with the present resources of the expedition; and that it was therefore my duty to return to England with the account of our late proceedings, that no time might be lost in following up the success with which we had been favoured, should his majesty's government consider it expedient to do so. Having informed the officers and men in both ships of my intentions, I directed the full allowance of provisions to be in future issued, with such a proportion of fuel as might contribute to their comfort; a luxury which, on account of the necessity that existed for the strictest economy in this article, it must be confessed, we had not often enjoyed since we entered Sir James Lancaster's Sound. We had been on two thirds allowance of bread between ten and eleven months, and on the same reduced proportion of the other species of provisions between three and four; and, although this quantity is scarcely enough for working men for any length of time, I believe the reduction of fuel was generally considered by far the greater privation of the two.
As it appeared to me that considerable service might be rendered by a general survey of the western coast of Baffin's Bay, which, from Sir James Lancaster's Sound southward, might one day become an important station for our whalers, I determined to keep as close to that shore during our passage down as the ice and the wind would permit; and as the experience of the former voyage had led us to suppose that this coast would be almost clear of ice during the whole of September, I thought that this month could not be better employed than in the examination of its numerous bays and inlets. Such an examination appeared to me more desirable, from the hope of finding some new outlet into the Polar Sea in a lower latitude than that of Sir James Lancaster's Sound; a discovery which would be of infinite importance towards the accomplishment of the Northwest Passage.
Progress down the Western Coast of Baffin's Bay.—Meet with theWhalers.—Account of some Esquimaux in the Inlet called the RiverClyde.—Continue the Survey of the Coast till stopped by Ice inthe Latitude of 68¼°.—Obliged to run to the Eastward.—FruitlessAttempts to regain the Land, and final Departure from theIce.—Remarks upon the probable Existence and Practicability of aNorthwest Passage, and upon the Whale Fishery.—Boisterous Weatherin Crossing the Atlantic.—Loss of the Hecla's Bowsprit andForemast.—Arrival in England.
The wind continuing fresh from the northward on the morning of the 1st of September, we bore up and ran along the land, taking our departure from the flagstaff in Possession Bay, bearing W.S.W. five miles, at half past four A.M.
The ice led us off very much to the eastward after leaving Pond's Bay; and the weather became calm, with small snow towards midnight. In this day's run, the compass-courses were occasionally inserted in the logbook, being the first time that the magnetic needle had been made use of on board the Hecla, for the purposes of navigation, for more than twelve months.
On the morning of the 3d we passed some of the highest icebergs I have ever seen, one of them being not less than one hundred and fifty to two hundred feet above the sea, judging from the height of the Griper's masts when near it.
The vegetation was tolerably luxuriant in some places upon the low land which borders the sea, consisting principally of the dwarf-willow, sorrel, saxifrage, and poppy, with a few roots of scurvy-grass. There was still a great deal of snow remaining even on the lower parts of the land, on which were numerous ponds of water; on one of these, a pair of young red-throated divers, which could not rise, were killed; and two flocks of geese, one of them consisting of not less than sixty or seventy, were seen by Mr. Hooper, who described them as being very tame, running along the beach before our people, without rising, for a considerable distance. Some glaucous gulls and plovers were killed, and we met with several tracks of bears, deers, wolves, foxes, and mice. The coxswain of the boat found upon the beach part of the bone of a whale, which had been cut at one end by a sharp instrument like an axe, with a quantity of chips lying about it, affording undoubted proof of this part of the coast having been visited at no distant period by Esquimaux; it is more than probable, indeed, that they may inhabit the shores of this inlet, which time would not now permit us to examine. More than sixty icebergs of very large dimensions were in sight from the top of the hill, together with a number of extensive floes to the northeast and southeast, at the distance of four or five leagues from the land.
While occupied in attending to the soundings, soon after noon, our astonishment may readily be conceived on seeing from the masthead a ship, and soon after two others, in the offing, which were soon ascertained to be whalers, standing in towards the land. They afterward bore up to the northward along the edge of the ice which intervened between us, and we lost sight of them at night. It was now evident that this coast, which had hitherto been considered by the whalers as wholly inaccessible in so high a latitude, had become a fishing station, like that on the opposite or Greenland shore; and the circumstance of our meeting so few whales in Sir James Lancaster's Sound this season was at once accounted for by supposing, what, indeed, we afterward found to be the case, that the fishing-ships had been there before us, and had, for a time, scared them from that ground.
It was so squally on the morning of the 5th that we could scarcely carry our double-reefed topsails, while, as we afterward learned from the fishing-ships, which were in sight at daylight, there was scarcely a breath of wind at a few leagues' distance from the land. We coasted this low shore, as we had done in the preceding voyage, at the distance of two or three miles, having from twenty-three to twenty-nine fathoms water. We here met with another of our fishing-ships, which proved to be the Lee, of Hull, Mr. Williamson, master; from whom we learned, among other events of a public nature which were altogether new to us, the public calamity which England had sustained in the death of our late venerable and beloved sovereign, and also the death of his Royal Highness the Duke of Kent. Mr. Williamson, among others, had succeeded in getting across the ice to this coast as high as the latitude of 73°, and had come down to this part in pursuit of the fish. One or two of the ships had endeavoured to return home by running down this coast, but had found the ice so close about the latitude of 69½° as to induce most of the others to sail back to the northward, in order to get back in the same way that they came. Mr. Williamson also reported his having, a day or two before, met with some Esquimaux in the inlet named the River Clyde in 1818, which was just to the southward of us. Considering it a matter of some interest to communicate with these people, who had, probably, not been before visited by Europeans, and that it might, at the same time, be useful to examine the inlet, I bore up, as soon as I had sent our despatches and letters on board the Lee, and stood in towards the rocky islet, called Agnes's Monument, passing between it and the low point which forms the entrance to the inlet on the northern side.
At six in the evening of the 6th, being near the outermost of the islands with which we afterward found this inlet to be studded, we observed four canoes paddling towards the ships; they approached with great confidence, and came alongside without the least appearance of fear or suspicion. While paddling towards us, and, indeed, before we could plainly perceive their canoes, they continued to vociferate loudly; but nothing like a song, nor even any articulate sound, which can be expressed by words, could be distinguished. Their canoes were taken on board by their own desire, plainly intimated by signs, and with their assistance, and they at once came up the side without hesitation. These people consisted of an old man, apparently much above sixty, and three younger, from nineteen to thirty years of age. As soon as they came on deck, their vociferations seemed to increase with their astonishment, and, I may add, their pleasure; for the reception they met with seemed to create no less joy than surprise. Whenever they received a present or were shown anything which excited fresh admiration, they expressed their delight by loud and repeated ejaculations, which they sometimes continued till they were quite hoarse and out of breath with the exertion. This noisy mode of expressing their satisfaction was accompanied by a jumping, which continued for a minute or more, according to the degree of the passion which excited it, and the bodily powers of the person who exercised it; the old man being rather too infirm, but still doing his utmost to go through the performance.
After some time passed on deck, during which a few skins and ivory knives were bought from them, they were taken down into the cabin. The younger ones received the proposal to descend somewhat reluctantly, till they saw that their old companion was willing to show them the example, and they then followed without fear. Although we were much at a loss for an interpreter, we had no great difficulty in making the old man understand, by showing him an engraved portrait of an Esquimaux, that Lieutenant Beechey was desirous of making a similar drawing of him. He was accordingly placed on a stool near the fire, and sat for more than an hour with very tolerable composure and steadiness, considering that a barter for their clothes, spears, and whalebone was going on at the same time near him. He was, indeed, kept quiet by the presents which were given him from time to time; and when this failed, and he became impatient to move, I endeavoured to remind him that we wished him to keep his position, by placing my hands before me, holding up my head and assuming a grave and demure look. We now found that the old gentleman was a mimic, as well as a very good-natured and obliging man; for, whenever I did this he always imitated me in such a manner as to create considerable diversion among his own people as well as ours, and then very quietly kept his seat. While he was sitting for his picture, the other three stood behind him, bartering their commodities with great honesty, but in a manner which showed them to be no strangers to traffic. If, for instance, a knife was offered for any article, they would hesitate for a short time, till they saw we were determined to give no higher price, and then at once consented to the exchange. In this case, as well as when anything was presented to them, they immediately licked it twice with their tongues, after which they seemed to consider the bargain satisfactorily concluded. The youngest of the party very modestly kept behind the others, and, before he was observed to have done so, missed several presents, which his less diffident, though not importunate companions had received. As the night closed in they became desirous to depart, and they left us before dark, highly delighted with their visit. As I had purchased one of their canoes, a boat was sent to land its late owner, as only one person can sit in each. Mr. Palmer informed me, that, in going on shore, the canoes could beat our boat very much in rowing whenever the Esquimaux chose to exert themselves, but they kept close to her the whole way. During the time that they were on board, we had observed in them a great aptness for imitating certain of our words; and, while going on shore, they took a particular liking to the expression of "Hurra, give way!" which they heard Mr. Palmer use to the boat's crew, and which they frequently imitated, to the great amusement of all parties.
Soon after we had landed on the 7th, the old Esquimaux and one of his younger companions paddled over from the main land, and joined us upon the island. They brought with them, as before, some pieces of whalebone and sealskin dresses, which were soon disposed of, great care being taken by them not to produce more than one article at a time; returning to their canoes, which were at a little distance from our boat, after the purchase of each of their commodities, till their little stock was exhausted. Considering it desirable to keep up among them the ideas of fair and honest exchange, which they already seemed to possess in no ordinary degree, I did not permit them to receive anything as presents till all their commodities had been regularly bought. While we were waiting to obtain the sun's meridian altitude, they amused themselves in the most good-natured and cheerful manner with the boat's crew; and Lieutenant Hoppner, who, with Mr. Beverly, had joined us in the Griper's boat, took this opportunity of making a drawing of the young man. It required, however, some show of authority, as well as some occasional rewards, to keep him quietly seated on the rock for a time sufficient for this purpose; the inclination they have to jump about, when much pleased, rendering it a penalty of no trifling nature for them to sit still for half an hour together. To show their disposition to do us what little service was in their power, he afterward employed himself in sharpening the seamen's knives, which he did with great expertness on any flat smooth stone, returning each, as soon as finished, to its proper owner, and then making signs for another, which he sharpened and returned in the same way, without any attempt, and apparently without the smallest desire, to detain it. The old man was extremely inquisitive, and directed his attention to those things which appeared useful rather than to those which were merely amusing. An instance of this occurred on my ordering a tin canister of preserved meat to be opened for the boats' crews' dinner. The old man was sitting on the rock, attentively watching the operation, which was performed with an axe struck by a mallet, when one of the men came up to us with a looking-glass. I held it up to each of the Esquimaux, who had also seen one on the preceding evening, and then gave it into each of their hands successively. The younger one was quite in raptures, and literally jumped for joy for nearly a quarter of an hour: but the old man, having had one smile at his own queer face, immediately resumed his former gravity, and, returning me the glass, directed his whole attention to the opening of the canister, and, when this was effected, begged very hard for the mallet which had performed so useful an office, without expressing the least wish to partake of the meat, even when he saw us eating it with good appetites. Being prevailed on, however, to taste a little of it, with some biscuit, they did not seem at all to relish it, but ate a small quantity, from an evident desire not to offend us, and then deposited the rest safely in their canoes. They could not be persuaded to taste any rum after once smelling it, even when much diluted with water. I do not know whether it be a circumstance worthy of notice, that when a kaleidoscope or a telescope was given them to look into, they immediately shut one eye; and one of them used the right, and the other the left eye.
In getting out of their canoes, as well as into them, great care is required to preserve the balance of these frail and unsteady coracles, and in this they generally assist each other. As we were leaving the island, and they were about to follow us, we lay on our oars to observe how they would manage this; and it was gratifying to see that the young man launched the canoe of his aged companion, and, having carefully steadied it alongside the rock till he had safely embarked, carried his own down, and contrived, though with some difficulty, to get into it without assistance. They seem to take especial care, in launching their canoes, not to rub them against the rocks, by placing one end gently in the water, and holding the other up high, till it can be deposited without risk of injury. As soon as we commenced rowing, the Esquimaux began to vociferate their newly-acquired expression of "Hurra, give way!" which they continued at intervals, accompanied by the most good-humoured merriment, as we crossed over to the main land. There being now a little sea, occasioned by a weather tide, we found that our boats could easily beat their canoes in rowing, notwithstanding their utmost endeavours to keep up with us.
The two Esquimaux tents which we were now going to visit were situated just within a low point of land, forming the eastern side of the entrance to a considerable branch of the inlet, extending some distance to the northward. The situation is warm and pleasant, having a southwesterly aspect, and being in every respect well adapted for the convenient residence of these poor people. We landed outside the point, and walked over to the tents, sending our boats, accompanied by the two canoes, round the point to meet us. As soon as we came in sight of the tents, every living animal there, men, women, children, and dogs, were in motion; the latter to the top of the hill out of our way, and the rest to meet as with loud and continued shouting; the wordpilletay(give me) being the only articulate sound we could distinguish amid the general uproar. Besides the four men whom we had already seen, there were four women, one of whom, being about the same age as the old man, was probably his wife; the others were about thirty, twenty-two, and eighteen years of age. The first two of these, whom we supposed to be married to the two oldest of the young men, had infants slung in a kind of bag at their backs, much in the same way as gipsies are accustomed to carry their children. There were also seven children, from twelve to three years of age, besides the two infants in arms, or, rather, behind their mothers' backs; and the woman of thirty was with child.
We began, as before, by buying whatever they had to dispose of, giving in exchange knives, axes, brass kettles, needles, and other useful articles, and then added such presents as might be farther serviceable to them. From the first moment of our arrival until we left them, or, rather, till we had nothing left to give, the females were particularly importunate with us, and "pilletay" resounded from the whole troop, wherever we went; they were extremely anxious to obtain our buttons, apparently more on account of the ornament of the crown and anchor which they observed upon them than from any value they set upon their use; and several of these were cut off our jackets to please their fancy. When I first endeavoured to bargain for a sledge, the persons I addressed gave me distinctly to understand by signs that it was not their property, and pointed towards the woman who owned it; though my ignorance in this respect offered a good opportunity of defrauding me, had they been so inclined, by receiving an equivalent for that which did not belong to them: on the owner's coming forward, the bargain was quickly concluded. The pikes which I gave in exchange underwent the usual ceremony of licking, and the sledge was carried to our boat with the most perfect understanding on both sides. In another instance, an axe was offered by some of the Griper's gentlemen as the price of a dog, to which the woman who owned the animal consented. To show that we placed full confidence in them, the axe was given to her before the dog was caught, and she immediately went away with a kind of halter or harness of thongs, which, they use for this purpose, and honestly brought one of the finest among them, though nothing would have been easier than to evade the performance of the contract. The readiness, however, with which they generally parted with their commodities, was by no means the effect of fear, nor did it always depend on the value of the articles offered in exchange; for having, as I thought, concluded a bargain for a second canoe belonging to the old woman, I desired the men to hand it down to the boat; but I soon perceived that I had misunderstood her, for she clung fast to the canoe, and cried most piteously till it was set down; I then offered a larger price than before, but she could not be induced to part with it.
The stature of these people, like that of Esquimaux in general, is much below the usual standard. The height of the old man, who was rather bent by age, was four feet eleven inches; and that of the other men, from five feet four and a half to five feet six inches. Their faces are round and plump in the younger individuals; skin smooth; complexion not very dark, except that of the old man; teeth very white; eyes small; nose broad, but not very flat; hair black, straight, and glossy; and their hands and feet extremely diminutive. The old man had a gray beard, in which the black hairs predominated, and wore the hair rather long upon his upper lip, which was also the case with the eldest of the three others.
The grown-up females measured from four feet ten to four feet eleven inches. The features of the two youngest were regular; their complexions clear, and by no means dark; their eyes small, black, and piercing; teeth beautifully white and perfect; and, although the form of their faces is round and chubby, and their noses rather flat than otherwise, their countenances might, perhaps, be considered pleasing, even according to the ideas of beauty which habit has taught us to entertain. Their hair, which is jet-black, hangs down long and loose about their shoulders, a part of it on each side being carelessly platted, and sometimes rolled up into an awkward lump, instead of being neatly tied on the top of the head, as the Esquimaux women in most other parts are accustomed to wear it. The youngest female had much natural bashfulness and timidity, and we considered her to be the only unmarried one, as she differed from the other three in not being tattooed upon the face. Two of them had their hands tattooed also, and the old woman had a few marks of the same kind about each wrist. None of the men or children were thus distinguished.
The children were generally good-looking, and the eldest boy, about twelve years of age, was a remarkably fine and even handsome lad. They were rather scared at us at first; but kind treatment and a few trifling presents soon removed their fears, and made them almost as importunate as the rest.
The dress of the men consists of a sealskin jacket, with a hood, which is occasionally drawn over the head, of which it forms the only covering. The breeches are also generally of sealskin, and are made to reach below the knee; and their boots, which meet the breeches, are made of the same material. In this dress we perceived no difference from that of the other Esquimaux, except that the jacket, instead of having a pointed flap before and behind, as usual, was quite straight behind, and had a sort of scallop before in the centre. In the dress of the women there was not so much regard to decency as in that of the men. The jacket is of sealskin, with a short, pointed flap before, and a long one behind, reaching almost to the ground. They had on a kind of drawers, similar to those described by Crantz as the summer dress of the Greenland women, and no breeches. The drawers cover the middle part of the body, from the hips to one third down the thigh, the rest of which is entirely naked as far as the knee. The boots are like those of the men; and, besides these, they have a pair of very loose leggins, as they may be called, which hang down carelessly upon the top of the boots, suffering their thighs to be exposed in the manner before described, but which may be intended occasionally to fasten up, so as to complete the covering of the whole body. The children are all remarkably well clothed; their dress, both in male and female, being in every respect the same as that of the men, and composed entirely of sealskin very neatly sewed.
The tents which compose their summer habitations are principally supported by a long pole of whalebone, fourteen feet high, standing perpendicularly, with four or five feet of it projecting above the skins which form the roof and sides. The length of the tent is seventeen, and its breadth from seven to nine feet, the narrowest part being next the door, and widening towards the inner part, where the bed, composed of a quantity of the small shrubby plant, theAndromeda Tetragona, occupies about one third of the whole apartment. The pole of the tent is fixed where the bed commences, and the latter is kept separate by some pieces of bone laid across the tent from side to side. The door, which faces the southwest, is also formed of two pieces of bone, with the upper ends fastened together, and the skins are made to overlap in that part of the tent, which is much lower than the inner end. The covering is fastened to the ground by curved pieces of bone, being generally parts of the whale; the tents were ten or fifteen yards apart, and about the same distance from the beach.
The canoe which I purchased, and which was one of the best of the five that we saw, is sixteen feet eleven inches in length, and its extreme breadth two feet one inch and a half; two feet of its fore end are out of the water when floating. It differs from the canoe of Greenland in being somewhat lower at each end, and also in having a higher rim or gunwale, as it may be termed, round the circular hole where the man sits, which may make them somewhat safer at sea. Their construction is, in other respects, much the same; the timbers or ribs, which are five or six inches apart, as well as the fore and aft connecting pieces, being of whalebone or drift-wood, and the skins with which they were covered, those of the seal and walrus. When the canoes are taken on the shore, they are carefully placed upon two upright piles or pillars of stones, four feet high from the ground, in order to allow the air to pass under to dry them, and prevent their rotting. The paddle is double and made of fir, the edges of the blade being covered with hard bone to secure them from wearing.
The spears or darts which they use in killing seals and other sea animals, consist, like the harpoons of our fishermen, of two parts, a staff, and the spear itself; the former is usually of wood, when so scarce and valuable a commodity can be obtained, from three and a half to five feet in length, and the latter of bone, about eighteen inches long, sometimes tipped with iron, but more commonly ground to a blunt point at one end, while the other fits into a socket in the staff, to which it is firmly secured by thongs. The lines which they attach to their spears are very neatly cut out of sealskins, and, when in a state of preparation, are left to stretch till dry between the tents, and then made up into coils for use. They make use of a bladder fastened to the end of the line, in the same manner as the other Esquimaux. Besides the spears, we purchased an instrument having a rude hook of iron let into a piece of bone, and secured by thongs to a staff, the hook being sharply pointed, but not barbed. While we were on the island (to which I had applied the name of Observation Island), it happened that a small bird flew near us, when one of the Esquimaux made a sign of shooting it with a bow and arrow in a manner which could not be misunderstood. It is remarkable, therefore, that we could not find about their tents any of these weapons, except a little one of five or six inches long, the bow being made of whalebone and the arrow of fir, with a feather at one end and a blunt point of bone at the other, evidently appearing to be a child's toy, and intended, perhaps, to teach the use of it at an early age.
The runners of the only sledge we saw were composed of the right and left jawbones of a young whale, being nine feet nine inches long, and one foot seven inches apart, and seven inches high from the ground. They are connected by a number of parallel pieces, made out of the ribs of the whale, and secured transversely with seizings of whalebone, so as to form the bottom of the sledge, and the back is made of two deers' horns placed in an upright position. The lower part of the runners is shod with a harder kind of bone, to resist the friction against the ground. The whole vehicle is rudely executed, and, being nearly twice the weight of the sledges we saw among the northern Esquimaux, is probably intended for carrying heavy burdens. The dogs were not less than fifty or sixty in number, and had nothing about them different from those on the eastern coast of Baffin's Bay, except they do not stand near so high as those of the latitude of 76°. They are very shy and wild, and the natives had great difficulty in catching them while we were by, as well as holding them in when caught. Some of them have much more of the wolf in their appearance than others, having very long heads and sharp noses, with a brushy tail, almost always carried between the legs; while the bodies of others are less lank, as well as their noses less sharp, and they carry their tails handsomely curled over their backs: their colour varied from quite dark to brindled. The ravenous manner in which they devour their food is almost incredible. Both the old and young ones, when a bird is given them, generally swallow feathers and all; and an old dog that I purchased, though regularly fed while on board by a person appointed for that purpose, ate up, with great avidity, a large piece of canvass, a cotton handkerchief, which one of the men had just washed and laid down by his side, and a part of a check shirt. The young dogs will at any time kill themselves by over-eating if permitted. The children appeared to have some right of property in the smaller puppies, or else their parents are very indulgent to them, for several bargains of this kind were made with them, without any objection or interference on the part of the parents, who were standing by at the time.