] 90 APPENDIX. No. J. 



of rock-crystals and flakes showed where the artificers in 

 stone had been making arrow or harpoon heads. Close to 

 Cape Beechey, and about six or seven miles from the eighty- 

 second parallel of latitude, we came across the most northern 

 traces of man that have yet been found ; these consisted of 

 the framework of a large wooden sledge, a stone lamp in 

 good preservation, and a very perfect snow-scraper made out 

 of a walrus tusk. Taking into consideration that where these 

 relics were found is the narrowest part of Robeson Channel, 

 at this point not more than thirteen miles across, and that a 

 few miles to the south, on the opposite shore of Hail Land, 

 the ' Polaris ' Expedition found traces of summer encamp- 

 ments, I am inclined to believe that this must have been the 

 spot selected for crossing over the channel ; and owing pro- 

 bably to the difficult and dangerous nature of the ice to be 

 encountered, the heavy sledge and impedimenta were left 

 behind. On Offley Island, at the entrance of Petermann 

 Fiord, Mr. Bryan * of the ' Polaris ' found an old Eskimo 

 settlement, consisting of the remains of several stone huts, 

 whilst the ground around was strewed with the bleached 

 bones of animals that had constituted the food of the inhabi- 

 tants. Northwards from Cape Beechey no trace of man was 

 discovered by any of our travelling parties, neither westward 

 along the shores of Grinnell Land, nor eastward along the 

 coasts of Greenland that border the Polar Sea. I feel satisfied 

 that the men whose tracks we followed as far as lat. 82 N., 

 never passed Cape Union. Even in July and August, animal 

 life is too scarce along the shores of the Polar Sea to support 

 a party of wandering Eskimo, whilst the idea of winter resi- 

 dence is beyond consideration. There is no essential reason 

 why the Eskimo should have travelled around the northern 

 shores of the Greenland continent in order to reach its eastern 

 coast ; the presence of the tribe seen by Sabine and Clavering 

 on that side of Greenland may be accounted for by their 

 having doubled Cape Farewell from the westward. It is well 



1 Narr. < Polaris,' North Polar Exp., pp. 371-372. 



