Jane, 1865.] Tlw Wami SettsoH Approacliing. 175 



Nu-ker-ziioo^ on leaving his igloo, took out, according to custom, 

 all his skulls and bones to the ice some distance off. Kljierbing was 

 snow-bhnd. He had come in from his deer-hunt looking like a pillar 

 of snow and his dogs like small snow-drifts. He had found Ar-mou's 

 wife wandering about in the snow, for she had lost the way to her own 

 tu-pik, and could not as yet enter any other. Despite of his woolen 

 mittens, Hall's own fingers now tingled more with cold than they had 

 done during the whole winter, and the change brought to him a sick- 

 ness ; but, like a number of attacks experienced since his first landing, 

 this was but temporary. He was again cheered by letters from Cap- 

 tain Chapel, brought by two natives who had left the ships on tlie lOtli 

 of April. 



The first five days in June were in marked contrast with the 

 end of May. The glowing sunsets, which mirrored themselves in the 

 water of tlie Wager, closed upon hours favorable for observations and 

 for hunting. Hall's boat, the Sylvia, with its stores, was brought 

 across from the south side of the river. By ascertaining with his sex- 

 tant that the ice-foot on the other side, 20 feet in height, subtended an 

 angle of 5', he determined the breadth of the Wager to be two and a 

 half miles. 



The tu-piks had been again set up on an island called Noo-oot-lik, 

 which forms one of the chain lying close along shore of the river. On 

 this many circles and stone monuments were found. On the 5th, tak- 



not be equaled iu wretcliedness of appearance ; but I was yet to learn that of all luiscrablo 

 places on earth a snow village recently deserted is the most gloomy. The huts, -when viewed 

 from without, glisten beneath the rays of a spring sun with a brilliancy which dazzles and pains 

 the eye ; but the contrast within is therefore the more striking. The roofs melted into icicles 

 and coated with smoke ; arches broken and falling from decay ; the snow-seats, floors, and parti- 

 tions covered with every kind of filth and rubbish — bones, broken utensils, and scraps of skins — 

 form altogether the most deplorable picture, while the general air of misery is tenfold aug- 

 mented by the strong glare of light which shoots through the hole once occupied by a window." 



