[902] NEW LAND IN SIGHT 



29 



snow between, the arrangement was very irregular and gave us 

 no very definite information. 



^ December T^. — . . . Our pemmican bag for this week by 

 an oversight has been slung alongside a tin of paraffin, and is 

 consequently strongly impregnated with the oil ; one can both 

 smell and taste the latter strongly ; it is some proof of the 

 state of our appetites that we really don't much mind ! 



'We are now sufficiently close to the land to make out 

 some of its details. On our right is a magnificent range of 

 mountains, which we are gradually opening out, and which 

 must therefore run more or less in an east-and-west direction. 

 My rough calculations show them to be at least fifty miles 

 from us, and, if so, their angle of altitude gives a height of 

 over 10,000 feet. The eastern end of this range descends to 

 a high snow-covered plateau, through which arise a number of 

 isolated minor peaks, which I think must be volcanic ; beyond 

 these, again, is a long, rounded, sloping snow-cape, merging 

 into the barrier. These rounded snow-capes are a great 

 feature of the coast ; they can be seen dimly in many places, 

 both north and south of us. They are peculiar as presenting 

 from all points of view a perfectly straight line inclined at a 

 slight angle to the horizon. North of this range the land still 

 seems to run on, but it has that detached appearance, due to 

 great distance, which we noted before, and we can make little 

 of it. The south side of the range seems to descend com- 

 paratively abruptly, and in many cases it is bordered by 

 splendid high cliffs, very dark in colour, though we cannot 

 make out the exact shade. Each cliif has a band of white 

 along its top where the ice-cap ends abruptly ; at this distance 

 it has a rather whimsical resemblance to the sugaring of a 

 Christmas cake. The cliffs and foothills of the high range 

 form the northern limit of what appears to be an enormous 

 strait ; we do not look up this strait, and therefore cannot say 

 what is beyond, but the snow-cape on this side is evidently a 

 great many miles from the high range, and there appears to 

 be nothing between. This near snow-cape seems to be more 

 or less isolated. It is an immense and almost dome-shaped, 



