Ice-beds on Eschscholtz Bay 97 



up an account of the fossil remains then procured with illustrative 

 plates, and Captain Beechey published a plan of the locality." 



" This plan comprises a nearly square section of country, having a 

 width and length of about fourteen miles. The Buckland River, 

 where it bends to the northward to fall into Eschscholtz Bay, flanks 

 the district on its inland or eastern border. From the mouth of this 

 river the coast-line trends nearly due west to Eschscholtz Bluff, and 

 forms the south side of that bay ; the shore for one-half of the way, 

 or about seven miles, between the Bluff and Elephant Point, being 

 composed of high icy clift"s, and for the remainder of the distance, 

 or from Elephant Point to the river, the coast is low and slightly 

 incurved. The west face of the land fronts Kotzebue Sound and is 

 formed of slaty gneiss rocks, which terminate on the north at Esch- 

 scholtz Bluff, and ten or twelve miles to the southward the rocky 

 eminences, taking an inland direction, are flanked by low marshy 

 ground. A ridge of hills nms nearly parallel to the western shore at 

 a distance of a mile and a quarter ; and at their southern angle, where 

 they bend inland, there stands still nearer the coast-line one of the 

 loftiest bluff's, ascertained to be 640 feet high. From this corner the 

 course of the range is south-easterly, the swampy country above 

 mentioned running along its base. The banks of the Buckland are 

 also represented as being high, if not hilly [p. 4], and they enclose, 

 in conjunction with the range, a sloping valley or basin, drained by 

 numerous rivulets, and opening to the north on the low coast east- 

 ward of Elephant Point. At the western entrance of the Buckland 

 there is a minor display of frozen mud-cliffs ; similar deposits exist 

 also on its eastern bank as well as on the north shore of Eschscholtz 

 Bay, likewise on various points of the coast between Bering's Strait 

 and Point Barrow ; but fossils have been detected only in Eschscholtz 

 Bay, and on the banks of a few rivers that join Bering's Sea between 

 it and Mount St. Elias. 



[Richardson here gives extracts from the Narrative of Captain 

 Beechey's voyage which I quote on a previous page and do not 

 repeat here. Commenting upon the holes dug by Mr. Collie, three 

 feet and five yards back from the edge of the cliff in which frozen 

 earth was found at eleven and twenty inches depth, Richardson 

 says in a footnote :] " Had the pits been sunk at a distance from the 

 edge of the cliff to the depth of three or four yards, information of 

 a more decided character would have been obtained ; for the experi- 

 ments do not of themselves prove satisfactorily that the frozen mud 



° Zoology of Captain Beechey's Voyage. 1839. 



