Rocks and Debris on the Ice. \\)1 



been drifting' along by this island, and every now and then pieces of ice bore npon 

 their smface stones and rocks fully exposed. As the -waves lilted them np, rock- 

 ing them to and fro, exposing one side or one end of each of these, strata of stones 

 were to be seen. These masses of ice had been disengaged from a belt of hnm- 

 mncky floe that was a part of the lixed ice during the past winter in Uaviland 

 Bay. Uow these masses of ice charged with earthy matter get into the midst of 

 a fixed floe overlying deep water is easily accounted for. A cold summer per- 

 haps succeeds the winter, and before this ice is dissolved, another winter sets 

 in and fastens it firmly in the midst of a new floe, or surrounds it with old hum- 

 mocky ice; all of Avliich becomes cemented together by the advancing cold, freez- 

 ing weather. * * # 



I must notice here what Parry says relative to the comparative times of 

 the dissolution of the shore-ice and water rushing in torrents from the land 

 in these northern regions : " It has been suggested that the floe may be held 

 down by its firm cementation to the shore while the water from the land above 

 it rushes in a torrent along its upper surface. This, however, is contrary to ex- 

 l)erience, which shows that long before the streams on the land are sufficient to 

 effect this, the ice next the shore is completely thawed and detached from the 

 beach, and, therefore, at liberty to float in the natural way." 



If I understand Parry rightly he means this : that, from his experience, 

 long before the snow^s on the land of this northern country melt — causing streams, 

 some of which rush in torrents — the ice next the shore completely thaws and 

 becomes detached from the beach. 



Now, my experience is directly the reverse of this ; that is to say, from 

 what I have seen, long before the ice next the shore thaws and becomes detached 

 from the beach, the snows on the land melt, causing streams — indeed, some, 

 rivers — some of these streams and rivers rushing torrent-like down the mountain- 

 sides and thence over the ice belting the shore, and over the ice covering the 

 waters of many bays, coves, and inlets. At the present time, wherever I look, the 

 land is almost completely denuded of snow, and has been so for weeks, while the 

 shores of the mainland and of the islands are in many places still belted with the 

 " ice-foot," as Dr. Kane termed the ice next the land. 



Until now, Eepulse Bay has been covered over, mostly with its fixed ice of 

 last winter's formation, and this while many of the rushing torrents have long 

 since dried up, their source— the melting snows— having disappeared. Wherever 

 these streams rim for a considerable time over the fixed floes, they cut their way — 



