MELVILLE FINDS REMAINS OF DE LONG PARTY 345 



the snow, its strap hitched over the poles. A few hundred yards 

 further on he came upon the remains so long sought, the dead bodies 

 of Captain DeLong and Surgeon Ambler. With them was that of 

 Ah Sam, the Chinese cook. By the side of DeLong lay his note- 

 book with the last feebly indicated words he had been able to write, 

 while under the poles were found the books and records which he 

 had carried with him to his sad end. The bodies of the others were 

 also found, with the exception of those of Erickson, one of the 

 seamen, and Alexai, an Indian, which were sought for in vain. 

 The journal afterwards showed that they had died and been buried 

 in the river. 



The natives who accompanied Melville could with difficulty be 

 induced to aid in getting the bodies out of the snow. It was neces- 

 sary to pry them up with sticks of wood, as they were frozen to the 

 ground. One arm of Captain DeLong had been seen lifted above 

 the snow, but his body was covered. 



After digging in the snow and finding a few small objects and 

 taking from the bodies all articles found upon them except a small 

 bronze crucifix found upon the person of Mr. Collins, which Mel- 

 villed ordered to be buried with him the preparations for return 

 were made. All the bodies were carried over the mountain to the 

 southward of Mat-Vai, where a tomb was dug on a high bluff, and 

 the bodies reverently interred. They were laid side by side in 

 regular order, as their names had been written on the vertical shaft 

 of a cross erected over the tomb. 



The tomb was covered with seven-inch plank and a pyramid of 

 large stones built over it, arrangements being subsequently made to 

 have it covered with a deep layer of earth to prevent the possibility 

 of the sun thawing the bodies below. Above this pyramid rose the 

 cross, twenty-two feet high and with an arm twelve feet in length. 

 Standing, as the cairn and cross did, on an eminence, they formed 

 conspicuous objects, which could be seen at a distance of twenty 

 miles. On the cross was the following inscription: 



