THE LAST CRUISE OF THE MIRANDA. 



93 



by some wonderful loomeries of seagulls. Steep, precipitous 

 cliffs rose to a height of two or three thousand feet straight 

 upward from the water, and these were thickly dotted with 

 thousands upon thousands of seagulls, perched in crowds on 



UP ISORTOK FIORD. 



ledges everywhere. As the Eskimos are very fond of a sea- 

 gull stew, and made signs that they would like to have some 

 of the birds, we fired a few shots at some of the crowded 

 ledges, and about half a dozen birds fell at every shot. They 

 filled the bottom of our boat, and looked so downy white and 

 pretty that it seemed almost a shame to sacrifice them, but 

 our provisions were so scarce that this slaughter of the in- 

 nocents was a necessity. The shots caused the birds to jump 

 from their perches, and soon countless thousands of screaming 

 gulls were circling all about us. It was impossible to make 

 any adequate estimate of their numbers. 



We reached Our camping-grounds at about four o'clock in 

 the afternoon, and pitched our two tents upon a mossy pla- 



