$6 NEAREST THE POLE 



pools off-shore were visible from the summit of 

 the hill. There was evidently sufficient slack in 

 the ice for a fresh southerly wind to form a 

 good shore lead. On the sixth, I sent two parties 

 of three hunters each, with supplies for ten days, 

 out for musk-oxen, one party going southeast, the 

 other southwest. Other Eskimos were sent out for 

 hare. On the seventh it cleared sufficiently to give 

 us our first view of Cape Hecla and the United States 

 Range. September 8th was a brilliant day; three 

 Eskimos came in from Black Cliffs Bay with twenty- 

 three hare aggregating two hundred and eleven pounds. 

 This made the number of hare killed along here nearly 

 one hundred. The Eskimos were started at over- 

 hauling sledges and making harnesses. The 9th was 

 a wonderfully mild day of brilliant sunshine for this 

 time and place. Sent a party to Porter Bay, just 

 south of Cape Hecla, the objective point I have in 

 view for the Roosevelt— a beautiful little bay which 

 I examined in 1902, with southern exposure and 

 protected from the running ice. A position here 

 would place us right at the beginning of our work, 

 would be convenient to the musk-ox haunts of Clements 

 Markham Inlet, and would be little or no farther than 

 Sheridan from the musk-ox preserves of the Lake 

 Hazen region. The dogs were all put ashore and 

 found the beds of dry gravel along the shore a much 

 more comfortable sleeping-place than the damp deck. 

 On the loth, the temperature rose to 20° and damp 

 snow fell during the night and day. Early in the 

 morning of the i ith, a fresh southerly wind commenced, 

 accompanied by a heavy drift and a lane of water 



