444 ARCTIC VOYAGES. Chap. XI. 



Fourth's Coronation Gulf, a mistake occasioned by 

 bringing the letters of the title on the chart too far 

 to the westward ; to the southward of it is Cape 

 Hearne, which Franklin and Richardson, in a former 

 visit to the mouth of the Copper Mine, saw only at 

 a distance, appearing as an island. To the south- 

 ward of Cape Hearne is the mouth of the Copper 

 Mine River. Richardson now announced to the 

 men that a short traverse would bring them to 

 the mouth of this river. " The gratifying in- 

 telligence," he says, " which we now conveyed 

 to them was totally unexpected, and the pleasure 

 they experienced found vent in heartfelt expressions 

 of gratitude to the Divine Being for his protection 

 on the voyage." 



The south coast of the Polar Sea could not be 

 expected to produce much variety of objects in the 

 vegetable part of the creation, remarkable either 

 for their utility or beauty. Dr. Richardson thus 

 sums up what he observed, or collected, on the por- 

 tion traversed by him, which he estimates at about 

 nine hundred miles : — 



" We noticed on the coast about one hundred and seventy 

 phcenogamous, or flowering plants, being one-fifth of the 

 number of species which exist fifteen degrees of latitude 

 farther to the southward. The grasses, bents, and rushes 

 constitute only one-fifth of the number of species on the 

 coast, but the two former tribes actually cover more ground 

 than all the rest of the vegetation. The cruciferous or 

 cross-like tribe afford one-seventh of the species, and the 



