BOATS SEWN TOGETHER. 209 



and rude wooden balls they had used still lying on 

 the mossy ground. Altogether there was some- 

 thing inexpressibly sad and desolate about the re- 

 mains of this unfortunate establishment; and by 

 the rude Norwegian sealers the place is regarded 

 with a degree of superstitious awe, which perhaps 

 may be the reason for the huts being in such a good 

 state of preservation. As my English sailors were 

 not afflicted with any similar scruples, and as we 

 were in urgent need of fire-wood, we took the liber- 

 ty of appropriating some pieces of one of the out- 

 houses, although I would not allow the standing 

 parts of the walls to be pulled down, in case the 

 huts might be called upon to do duty again as 

 winter-quarters for any shipwrecked crew. We 

 also broke up a large boat, which never could have 

 been made seaworthy again, and which, having 

 been thickly smeared with pitch, made excellent 

 fire-wood. This boat, instead of being fastened to- 

 gether with metal nails or rivets, had been sewed 

 together with twigs or withes of twisted birch, 

 and was even then surprisingly strong, the birchen 

 withes remaining quite sound and undecayed. This 

 construction of boat is, I believe, commonly used in 

 Siberia and Russian Lapland. 



We arrived in the "Anna Louisa" off Hvalfiske 

 Point on the evening of the 23d, and were surprised 

 not to find the yacht in the harbor ; so we took a 

 boat, and landed to see if Mr. Wood had left any 

 letters in the post-office to say where he was. On 







