316 INFLECTIONS ON WATERCOURSES. \Jltne, 



About 6.15 on the lyth of June we continued our 

 journey, which, from the rotten state of the ice, was con- 

 fined to the coast-line or across the gravel spits or ledges, 

 now denuded of snow and ice, and which appeared at a 

 former period to have barred the mouth of some great 

 estuary within, \vhere, from our higher stations, very con- 

 siderable lakes had been observed. These spits, in radii 

 from the great embouchure of the valley or river, are 

 rather puzzling, inasmuch as within our own observation 

 no river force has been noticed, and I verily believe has 

 not existed for years, or perhaps ages ; indeed reason is 

 opposed to any such fact : if any such force, as such ap- 

 pearances would indicate, had been in action, all the ice 

 must have been speedily washed away. During the last 

 season I know that, in three positions, no river force was 

 in action up to the first week in September ; I can only 

 therefore refer these appearances to that distant epoch 

 when perhaps the whales and other objects were depo- 

 sited on elevations of five hundred feet and upwards, and 

 other extraordinary influences were exercised throughout 

 these regions. Whatever those disturbances were, they 

 were not momentary. The summits of these mountain 

 ranges were probably submerged ; the subsidences or 

 parallels bear the impress of distinct periods of particular 

 action, spread possibly over ages, and are most beauti- 

 fully defined throughout this Arctic region by similarity 

 of action or of the successive retirement of the ocean ; 

 and it is only by referring to such stupendous move- 

 ments of Nature that I can at all recognize adequate 

 forces to denude, to gully out, and cut such vast water- 

 courses. I do not allude to trumpery valley gushcts, 



