32 THE POINT BARROW ESKIMO. 
early part of the winter this pack is most of the time in motion, some- 
times moving northeastward with the prevailing current and grinding 
along the edge of the barrier, sometimes moving off to sea before an oft- 
shore wind, leaving “leads” of open water, which in calm weather are 
immediately covered with new ice (at the rate of 6 inches in 24 hours), 
and again coming in with greater or less violence against the edges of 
this new ice, crushing and erumpling it up against the barrier. Portions 
of the land-floe even float off and move away with the pack at this season. 
The westerly gales of the later winter, however, bring in great quan- 
tities of ice, which, pressing against the land-floe, are pushed up into 
Inunmocks and ground firmly in deeper water, thus increasing the breadth 
of the fixed land-floe until the line of separation between the land-floe 
and the moving pack is 4or5or sometimes even 8 miles from land. The 
hummocks of the land-floe show a tendency to arrange themselves in 
lines parallel to the shore, and if the pressure has not been too great 
there are often fields of ice of the season not over 4 feet thick between 
the ranges of hummocks, as was the case in the winter of 188182. In 
the following year, however, the pressure was so great that there were 
no sueh fields, and even the level ice inside of the barrier was crushed 
into hummocks in many places. 
After the gales are over there is generally less motion in the pack, 
until about the middle of April, when easterly winds usually cause 
leads to open at the edge of the land-floe. These leads now continue to 
open and shut, varying in size with the direction and force of the wind. 
As the season advances, especially in July, the melting of the ice on 
the surface loosens portions of the land-floe, which float off and joi the 
pack, bringing the leads nearer to the shore. In the meantime the level 
shore ice has been cut away from the beach by the warm water running 
down from the land and has grown ‘rotten” and full of holes from the 
heat of the sun. By the time the outside ice has moved away so as to 
leave only the floes grounded on the bar the inside ice breaks up into 
loose masses, Moving up and down with wind and current and ready 
to move off through the first break in the barrier. Portions of the re- 
maining barrier gradually break off and at last the whole finally floats 
and moves out with the pack, sometimes, as in 1881—a very remarkable 
season—moving out of sight from the land. 
This final departure of the ice may take place at any time between 
the middle of July and the middle of August. East of Point Barrow 
we had opportunities only for hasty and superficial observations of the 
state of the ice. The land floe appears to form some distance outside 
of the sandy islands, and from the account of the natives there is much 
open water along shore early in the season, caused by the breaking up 
of the rivers. Dr. Simpson! learned from the natives that the trading 
parties which left the Point about the 1st of July found open water at 
Dease Inlet. This is more definite information than we were able to 
obtain. We only learned that they counted on finding open water a 
few days’ journey east. 
