MI-RUOCH.] TOPOGRAPHY OF THE COUNTRY. 29 



large bowlders arc absent, while pebbles larger than the fist are rare. 

 The surface of the ground is covered with a thin soil, supporting a rather 

 sparse vegetation of grass, flowering plants, creeping willows, and 

 mosses, which is thicker on the higher hillsides and forms a layer of 

 turf about a foot thick. Large tracts of comparatively level ground 

 are almost bare of grass, and consist of irregular hummocks of black, 

 muddy soil, scantily covered with light-colored lichens and full of small 

 pools. The lowlands, especially those back of the beach lagoons, are 

 marshes, thickly covered with grass and sphagnum. The whole sur 

 face of the land is exceedingly wet in summer., except the higher knolls 

 and hillsides, and for about 100 yards back from the edge of the cliffs. 

 The thawing, however, extends down only about a foot or eighteen 

 inches. Beyond this depth the ground is perpetually frozen for an 

 unknown distance. There are no streams of any importance in the im 

 mediate neighborhood of Point Barrow. On the other hand, three of 

 the rivers emptying into the Arctic Ocean between Point Harrow and 

 the Colville, which Dr. Simpson speaks of as &quot;small and hardly known 

 except to persons who have visited them,&quot; have been found to be con 

 siderable streams. Two of these were visited by Lieut. Ray in his ex 

 ploring trips in 1882 and 1883. The first, Kua ru, is reached after trav 

 eling about 50 miles from Point Barrow in a southerly direction. It 

 has been traced only for a small part of its course, and there is reason 

 to believe, from what the natives say, that it is a tributary of the sec 

 ond named river. Lieut. Ray visited the upper part of the second 

 river, Kulugrua (named by him &quot;Meade River&quot;), in March, 1882, when 

 he went out to join the native deer hunters encamped on its banks, just 

 on the edge of the hilly country. On his return lie visited what the 

 natives assured him was the mouth of this river, and obtained observa 

 tions for its geographical position. Early in April, 1883, lie again vis 

 ited the upper portion of the stream, and traced it back some distance 

 into the hilly country. The intermediate portion has never been sur 

 veyed. At the time of each of his visits the river was, of course, frozen 

 and the ground covered with snow, but he was able to see that the 

 river was of considerable size, upwards of 200 yards wide where, he first 

 reached it, about (50 miles from its mouth, and showing evidences of a 

 large volume of water in the spring. It receives several tributaries. (See 

 maps, Pis. i and n.) 



The third river is known only by hearsay from the natives. It is 

 called I kplkpun (Great Cliff), and is about 40 miles (estimated from 

 day s journeys) east of Kulu grua. It is described as being a larger and 

 more rapid stream than the other two, and so deep that it does not 

 freeze down to the bottom on the shallow bars, as they say Kulu grua 

 does. Not far from its mouth it is said to receive a tributary from 

 the east flowing out of a great lake of fresh water, called Ta/synkpun 

 (Great Lake.) This lake is separated from the sea by a comparatively 



1 Op. cit., p. 235. 



