268 A VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY 
some of the most remarkable peaked mountains [ 
ever saw, for some of them are so pointed, that 
they look at a distance not unlike the spires of a 
ruined building. ‘The land is mountainous, and 
exceedingly rugged, and is covered with snow 
down to the sea side. The rocks are composed 
entirely of granite and gneiss, the former of the 
kind that is termed, by geologists, the oldest 
granite, that is, consisting of large crystals of the 
different component parts, particularly the felspar. 
Fragments of beautiful white quartz were also very 
abundant here. Of the vegetable productions of 
this place we could say very little, for the land 
was, as I have already noticed, covered with snow, 
and besides it is too late in the season to collect 
plants in this climate. Of the animal kingdom we 
also saw but few specimens ; among these few, how- 
ever, were two red-throated divers which we shot, 
and which are the only birds of the kind that we 
met with this voyage. ‘Two flocks of Brent geese, 
some glaucous gulls, and a few snow-buntings, 
were, I believe, all the animals observed here. We 
saw, however, the tracks of bears, wolves, and foxes, 
in considerable numbers, and the track of some 
cloven-footed animal was also among them; we 
supposed it to be that of a musk-ox, but it was 
much larger than any we had seen before. We 
met also with bones of a whale, that had been 
thrown up on the beach, and not far from the 
same place were found indications of some people 
(probably Esquimaux) having been here, for a 
piece of whale-bone which they had cut was 
picked up, and, as a proof that it had not been 
