NATURAL HISTORY OF PRINCE ALBERT LAND. 3 
Prince Albert Land, and through the Dolphin and Union Strait, 
reaching Cambridge Bay on August 27th; there the ship took the 
ground, and remained until the ice set sufficiently firm to allow 
of the removal of everything out of the vessel to the shore; the 
‘ship floated on October 15th. The winter of 1852—53 was 
passed at Cambridge Bay on the south shore of Victoria Land, a 
position some two hundred and fifty miles farther east than that 
of Winter Cove. 
_ In the spring of 1853 the sledge-parties from the ‘Enterprise’ 
searched the eastern shores of Victoria Land, for traces of the 
lost Franklin Expedition, singularly enough passing up the very 
channel in which the ill-fated ‘Erebus’ and ‘Terror’ were 
abandoned in 1848, and examining the opposite shore to that 
where in 1859, M‘Clintock found the relics of the missing 
Expedition on King William Land. The sledge-parties returned 
to the ship on May 21st. On August 10th, 1853, the ‘Enterprise’ 
left Cambridge Bay, and sailing to the westward, after a perilous 
voyage, was detained for the winter of 1853—54, at Camden Bay, 
on the northern shore of the American continent, in lat. 70° 8’ N., 
long. 145° 29’ W. The ‘Enterprise’ was not able to leave 
Camden Bay until July 20th, 1854. Point Barrow was passed 
on the return voyage, August 8th; on September 16th the 
‘Enterprise’ sailed from Port Clarence, Behring Straits, for 
Hong Kong. 
The large island, to which the names of Prince Albert, 
Wollaston, and Victoria Land, have been given by successive 
explorers, occupies the very centre of the Parry Archipelago; 
it lies between the parallels of 68° 80’ and 73° 20’ N., and 
longitudes 100° and 120° W.; it is separated from the American 
continent by a comparatively narrow and shallow channel, 
varying in depth from a hundred to thirteen fathoms. If the 
rate of elevation continues, in these northern lands, as we are 
led to believe it does by the observation of recent explorers, 
it will only be a short time, in geological history, before Prince 
Albert Land and the continent of America are joined together. 
Roughly speaking, Prince Albert Land extends over an area of some 
four hundred miles east and west, and some three hundred miles 
north and south; the interior of this large island has not been 
explored. 
We are well acquainted with the zoology of Melville Island 
