NOTES FROM AN ARCTIC JOURNAL. 97 
wards, which debouched upon the coast in about lat. 82° 40’ N., 
as most likely to give us access to the United States Mountains. 
We saw that day a pair of Ptarmigan, Lagopus rupestris; they were 
very tame. I shot the male first, and the female did not move 
from the side of the dead bird. 
On the 15th, after a very arduous day’s work across a broad 
inlet, where the ice consisted of rugged blue-coloured floes of 
ancient ice, we gained the broad valley leading to the westward, 
which we had observed from our look-out station of the day 
before. About half a mile from the shore we disturbed a Snowy 
Owl from the ground; it flew across our path and alighted on a 
hill-side. I and Frederic, the Greenlander, left the sledge and 
went in pursuit, but, after several weary miles’ walk, had to give 
up the chase. The wary bird always rose when we got within a 
distance of eighty or a hundred yards. 
The 16th turned out very foggy, and as we advanced inland the 
snow became so soft and deep that the united exertions of men 
and dogs only enabled us to advance the sledge a few hundred 
yards in an hour. Finding further progress to the westward 
with our laden sledge impossible, owing to the softness and 
depth of the snow, we determined to go into camp; and the 
next day Egerton, Frederic and I started with the empty dog- 
sledge and one hundred feet of line, with a view of ascending a 
noble mountain, which we christened on the spot “The Great 
Pyramid,” but which afterwards received the name of Mount 
Grant. We were in hopes of ascending this fine peak, which 
rose from the northern slope of the valley, at a distance of some 
ten miles from camp, by taking advantage of the rising terraces 
on the northern face of the valley, and attaining a point on 
which the magnificent snow slope of “The Great Pyramid” 
seemed to abut. After five hours hard travelling we reached 
this point at an elevation of some nine hundred feet above the 
sea, meeting on our way with many tracks of Musk-oxen, a good 
deal of withered grass in spots, two Ptarmigan, and a single 
Snow Bunting; also the tracks of Fox, Hare, and Lemming. 
The rocks, where exposed, consisted of coarse quartzose-grit. 
Leaving Frederic and the dogs at this spot, Egerton and I 
climbed the shoulder of the hill and ascended to its summit, 
an elevation of 1825 feet by aneroid. From there we had a good 
view, as we looked to the northward across James Ross Bay 
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