THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 335 



there was but little vegetation on a surface of limestone that had 

 been split into fragments by the frosts of winter. 



From the 175- foot elevation I was able to see Prince Patrick 

 Island plainly to the southwest, but there was fog hanging lower 

 on the ice so that intervening islands could not be made out. To 

 the south I could see two islands and made the correct judgment 

 that one of them would be Fitzwilliam Owen Island of McClintock 

 and that the other a little to the east was new, later named Eight 

 Bears Island. Across an apparent bay in the coast we were fol- 

 lowing I could see the land continue its trend to the southeast. 



The next day we crossed the "bay" (which later proved a strait) 

 and found it to be about sixteen miles wide in a direct line SE from 

 our camp of June 20th to the one of June 21st. On the way across 

 I had an experience which illustrates how easily one may be de- 

 ceived into misidentifying even things seen in fairly clear weather. 



Baron Nordenskiold tells of mistaking a walrus for an island 

 and identifying the white tusks with two extensive glaciers coming 

 down between mountain ranges to the coast. Hanbury tells of mis- 

 taking a mouse for a polar ox, and Godfred Hansen describes how 

 his dogs ran up to and killed a polar bear which turned out to be 

 a fox. Similarly, I had myself on a previous expedition mistaken 

 a marmot {citellus parryi) for a grizzly bear. 



From what I had already seen my mind was made up that this 

 was an extensive land, and was thinking about how large it might 

 be as I was walking across the bay, following a course somewhat 

 more northerly than that of the sledges. I had almost reached the 

 beach on the east side and was just rounding a point when I looked 

 to the north and saw on the other side of the next low point the 

 top of a pressure ridge of sea ice. Then the land was not so very 

 large, or at any rate there was a deep fjord running into it from 

 the opposite side, for here I was looking across a low neck of 

 land at the sea ice on the other side. This was a discovery not 

 very pleasing, for although the scientific attitude is to be satisfied 

 with the truth whatever it is, still I knew very well the achieve- 

 ment of finding the absence of land is not popularly valued as 

 highly as demonstrating the presence of it, and the bigger the land 

 the greater the fame attached to the discovery. I was a bit dis- 

 consolate when I turned to the left, deciding that I would actually 

 cross the neck of land and measure in paces the distance from sea 

 ice to sea ice. 



But when I came to the top of the low ridge which had ap- 

 peared to separate me from the pressure ice, I found a shallow 



