Ice-beds on Eschscholtz Bay 69 



which I myself found a very fine tooth. \\'e could not assign any 

 reason for a strong smell, like that of burnt horn, which we per- 

 ceived in this place. The covering of these mountains, on which 

 the most luxuriant grass grows to a certain height, is only half a 

 foot thick, and consists of a mixture of clay, sand, and earth ; below 

 which the ice gradually melts away, the green cover sinks with it, 

 and continues to grow ; and thus it may be foreseen, that in a long 

 series of years, the mountain will vanish, and a green valley be 

 formed in its stead." 



[Narrative of a Voyage to the Pacific and Beering's Strait. By 

 Captain F. W. Beechey, R. N. Vol. I. 4to, in two parts. London, 1831. 

 Part I.] 



July 29, 1826, page 257. " While the duties of the ships w^ere 

 being forwarded under my first lieutenant, Mr. Peard, I took the 

 opportunity to visit the extraordinary ice-formation in Eschscholtz 

 Bay mentioned by Kotzebue as being ' covered with a soil half a foot 

 thick, producing the most luxuriant grass/ and containing an abund- 

 ance of mammoth bones. We sailed up the bay, which was ex- 

 tremely shallow, and landed at a deserted village on a low sandy 

 point, where Kotzebue bivouacked when he visited the place, and 

 to which I afterwards gave the name of Elephant Point, from the 

 bones of that animal being found near it. 



" The clififs in which this singular formation was discovered begin 

 near this point, and extend westw'ard in a nearly straight line to a 

 rocky clifif of primitive formation at the entrance of the bay, whence 

 the coast takes an abrupt turn to the southward. The clififs are 

 from twenty to eighty feet in height; and rise inland to a rounded 

 range of hills between four and five hundred feet above the sea. In 

 some places they present a perpendicular front to the northward, in 

 others a slightly inclined surface ; and are occasionally intersected 

 by valleys and water-courses generally overgrown with low bushes. 

 Opposite each of these valleys there is a projecting flat piece of 

 ground, consisting of the materials that have been washed dow^n 

 the ravine, where the only good landing for boats is afforded. The 

 soil of the cliffs is a bluish-coloured mud, for the most part covered 

 with moss and long grass, full of deep furrows, generally filled with 

 w^ater or frozen snow. Mud in a frozen state forms the surface of 

 the cliff in some parts ; in others the rock appears [p. 258] , with the 

 mud above it, or sometimes with a bank half way up it, as if the 

 superstratum had gradually slid down and accumulated against the 

 cliff'. By the large rents near the edges of the mud cliffs, they 



