450 THE ZOOLOGIST. : 
who came swooping down at us, passing within twenty or thirty 
feet of our heads. The other bird sat on the nest, which was 
placed on an inaccessible ledge. Dovekies were tolerably 
abundant, and were nesting in the cliffs, flying down to the 
pools between the floes for food, which they took to their young. 
I noticed that they seldom missed capturing a fish, Gadus 
Fabricii, at the first dive; this they held in their bills by the head 
as they flew back to the cliffs, but they did not carry more than” 
one fish at a time. 
On the 19th August the ships got to the northward of Cape 
Frazer, and on the evening of the same day Markham and I landed 
on Cape John Barrow; he ascended the heights to obtain a view 
of the offing, whilst I devoted the time to geological enquiry. The 
strata | examined at Cape John Barrow were nearly horizontal, 
with a slight dip to the N.N.W., true. The limestone split into 
slates, which were highly fossiliferous; but the fossils were very 
badly preserved, though specimens of Orthoceras, Strophomena, 
and Rhynchonella might be detected. Mr. Etheridge,* in referring 
to these specimens has fallen into a slight error—probably my 
own in want of care in labelling—by supposing these specimens 
obtained at Cape John Barrow and Hayes Point were drifted rocks. 
This was not the case; they were obtained im situ, and their strati- 
graphical position ascertained. 
To the northward of Cape Barrow the ice was not so closely 
packed as we had hitherto experienced in Smith Sound, and on 
the 22nd August we entered into a long expanse of open water, 
which enabled us to reach without difficulty as far north as 
latitude 81°. There, in the broad extension of the channel called 
Hall Basin, we were again stopped by the ice, and took shelter at 
the mouth of Bessels Bay, waiting for a lead. The sixty miles of 
comparatively open water which we passed through between Cape 
Collinson and Hall Basin was almost devoid of animal life. About 
a dozen Black Guillemots were seen, and a single Seal, but no 
Gull, Walrus, or Narwhal. 
Bessels Bay is a fiord cut by ice-action out of the limestone ; 
its perpendicular sides rise to a height of over a thousand feet at 
the entrance. Further inland numerous glaciers pour down its 
sides, the overflow of the mer-de-glace of Washington Land, which 
uniting in the fiord form one discharging glacier. Owing to the 
* Quarterly Journ. Geol. Soe., 1878, p. 603. 
