QrOTATIOXS FROM AX EXPLORER'S LETTERS VA 



even Franklin's wliolo comijlcnicnt of men would he, if anialganiatcd with the entire 

 body of Victoria Land Eskimo, insufficient to produce the markcdh' European type 

 actually found to-day. The validity of this objection can be judged only after we 

 have a complete census of the island and know how far the new type is present in 

 some localities above others. 



In regard to the possibility of Franklin's men having survived for a time, there 

 is the interesting contributory evidence that there are at various places people said 

 to be "named with the names of white men." One name in particular we have found 

 in practically every commimity: "Ngrk." This is, at Her.schel and farther west, 

 the Eskimo pronunciation of the English "Ned." 



OBSERVATIONS AXD SURVEYS IX OXE OF THE LAROEST UNEXPLORED AREAS IN CANADA* 



Eastward from Cape Lj-on open water was continually seen from three to ten 

 miles off shore till we reached Inman's River, when the edge of the flow made off 

 diagonally toward Prince Albert Sound, Victoria Land. There were heavy pressure- 

 ridges close inshore. In my opinion, if a sled journey were attempted from Cape 

 Parry to Nelson Head, Banks Land, as has been proposed, it could be more safely and 

 easily accomplished (and probably more quickly as well) bj' crossing the strait east 

 of Inman's River rather than by going directly across between the mentioned head- 

 lands. East of Point Wise the ice of Dolphin and I^nion Strait is always compara- 

 tivel}' level and on it the Eskimo of the strait have their winter houses. 



Although this is the first time the coast of the strait has been traversed in winter, 

 it has been four times skirted by water — by Dr. Richard.son in the twenties and 

 again in the forties and Cai)tain Collinson in the fifties of the last century and by 

 Anumdsen in 1905. Amundsen saw little of the land, of course. Dr. Richardson's 

 geological notes of the coast, on the other hand, are full and lieyond addition by n-e 

 at present. 



The pi-evailing winds in the strait and Coronation Crulf in winter, as cleai-l.\- 

 shown bj' the snowdrifts are northwest. For this reason there is i)lenty of drift- 

 wood along the mainland coast east beyond Cape B(>xlev but none on the \'ictoria 

 Land coast. 



Entering the Coppermine, we found llic first s))ruce shrubs a mile iiortli of Bloody 

 Fall. The fall itself, by the way, is no fall at all, but a rajjid about six hundred yards 

 long that reminded me somewhat of the Whitehorse Canon of the Yukon. From the 

 appearance of trees, the tree-line is within four miles east of the I'iver till one passes 

 the Musk Ox rapids; here a stream (about the size of Kemlall River) enters from 

 the east, and up this are trees for about ten miles. Of this river I made a compass 

 survey some fifteen miles up. Eskimo camp sites east of the Coppermine and north 

 of this small river are on practically every hilltop, "buttes" they would be called 

 in the American Southwest. Numerous ponds and some creeks and rivers abound 

 in Arctic trout ; there are no geese, cranes or swans, few ducks and few birds of any 

 kind as comj^ared with other Arctic districts I know; caribou are in some number. 



Dismal Lake I found to be about as charted by Hanbury and not as on previous 

 maps. The eastei-n iiranch of the Dease River has its source in a small creek that 

 heads about eight miles SW. (true) from the narrows of Dismal Lake (hit. 67° 2-1'). 

 This creek runs SW. some seven miles into a lake called by the Eskimo " I-ma-fr'-nirk". 

 The lake is some fom- by seven miles, its long axis SW.-NE. Of this and the 



'Quotations from a li'iUT to Director U. W. Brock, Geological Sui'V'ey, Canada. 



