164 THE GEEMAK AUCTTC EXPEDITION. 



inhabitants of the island, a pair of lonely gulls, watched 

 with evident curiosity from a rift in the rocks the arrival 

 of the strange visitors, and some guillemots fluttered 

 piping around the open water of the strait. It was 

 between the south-east point of the island, Cape Discord, 

 and the small Island of Ivimiut. About ten o'clock we 

 lay in a bay protected from the north wind, and sur- 

 rounded by high rocks, which we called " Hansa Haven." 

 Here we wished to pass the night, and had already brought 

 our things to shore with that intention, when the tide fell 

 and our boat grounded ; we therefore left the bay at about 

 twelve at night, pulling up at a piece of ice lying not far 

 from the land. It was now exactly four weeks since our 

 departure from the floe, which we had left with such confi- 

 dent hope of reaching the neighbouring shore in a few days. 



Whitsunday, glorious weather ! Messrs. Hildebrandt 

 and Bade went hunting in the boat Bismarck. They 

 brought home a small bag of twenty-two divers, the 

 flesh of which, prepared as a stew, provided us with two 

 excellent mid-day meals. This, however, only helped for 

 the moment ; and we had, at the utmost, only provisions 

 for fourteen days ! The hunters had been in the upper 

 part of the island. They saw along the southern coast 

 a small strip of water. " Everywhere we find nothing 

 but bare barren chfl's, the higher the wilder, sparingly 

 clothed with moss and stunted willows. But no trace of 

 human inhabitants!" Illuidlek, where Graah fell in with 

 some natives,^ seems to have been long uninhabited. 



On the second day, the 6th of June, we started again. 



* "Another family, consisting of six individuals, was established on a 

 point of land at Illuidlek, opposite Ivimiut." Graah's "Voyage to 

 Greenland," p. 70. 



