]876 ARCTIC VEGETATION. 141 



on the same spot, and it would thus appear that a 

 favourable combination of soil, shelter from winds, and 

 full exposure to the sun have more to do witli the 

 development of flowering plants in the Polar regions 

 than parallels of latitude. 



Two ermines, a male and female, were shot by 

 Lieutenant GifFard on Bellot Island. We had pre- 

 viously obtained a specimen in a fox's earth north of 

 Floeberg Beach, and Beaumont shot one on the shores 

 of North Greenland. Although a great number of 

 hares had been shot by the sportsmen from the ' Dis- 

 covery,' there still remained a large number ; many 

 of these were secured, and provided a daily meal of 

 fresh meat for our sick men while we remained in the 

 neighbourhood. 



During our enforced detention in Discovery Bay 

 the dredge and trawl were several times called into 

 requisition. 



On the 16th, the weather still remaining distress- 

 ingly fine and calm, an excursion was made to the 

 coal-beds near Cape Murchison. This deposit of coal, 

 or, more correctly, lignite, is exposed in a ravine near 

 Watercourse Bay, for a distance of over two hundred 

 yards. At its greatest exposure the thickness of the 

 seam is twenty-five feet, but we had no means of 

 ascertaining how much deeper it descended below the 

 level of the stream. Above the coal are beds of shale 

 and sandstones. In these shales were found a con- 

 siderable number of leaf impressions, similar to those 

 found in the Miocene coal-bearing strata of Disco 

 Island and the Nursoak Peninsula, as also in Spits- 

 bergen, leaving no doubt as to the geological age of 



