448 FIELD WORK OF THE PEARY ARCTIC CLUB, 1898-1902. 



Clear weather showed us the existence of open water a feAv miles off 

 the shore, extending from Dome Cape to Cape Washington. At Black 

 Cape there was a large open water reaching from the shore northward. 

 Everywhere along this coast I was impressed by the startling evi- 

 dences of the violence of the l)lizzard of a few days before. The 

 polar pack had been driven resistlessly in against the iron coast, and 

 at every projecting point had risen to the crest of the ridge of old ice, 

 along the outer edge of the ice foot in a terrific cataract of huge 

 blocks. In places these mountains of shattered ice were 100 feet or 

 more in height. The old ice in the bays and fjords had had its outer 

 edge loaded with a great ridge of ice fragments, and was itself cracked 

 and crumpled into huge swells by the resistless pressure. All the 

 voung ice which had helped us on our outward passage had l)een 

 crushed into countless fragments, and swallowed up in the general 

 chaos. 



Though hampered by fog. the passage from Cape North to Cape 

 Bryant was made in twenty-five and a half marching hours. At 7 

 a. m. of the 6th of June, we camped on the end of the ice foot, at the 

 eastern end of Black Horn Cliff's. A point a few hundred feet up the 

 bluff's coimnanding the region in front of the cliffs showed it to be 

 tilled by small ]:)ieces of old ice held in place against the shore by pres- 

 sure of the outside pack. It promised at best the heaviest kind of 

 work, with the certainty that it would run a1)road at the first release 

 of pressure. 



The next da}-, when about one-third the way across, the ice did begin 

 to open out, and it was only after a rapid and hazardous dash from 

 cake to cake that we reached an old floe, which after several hours of 

 heavy work allowed us to climb upon the ice-foot of the western end 

 of the cliff's. 



From here on rapid progress was made again, three more marches 

 taking us to Conger, where we arrived at 1.30 a. m. June 10, though 

 the open water between Repulse Harbor and Cape Brevoort, which 

 had now expanded down Robeson Channel to a point below Cape 

 Sumner and the rotten ice under Cape Sumner hampered us seriousl}". 

 In passing I took copies of the Beaumont English records from the 

 cairn at Repulse Harbor, and brought them back for the archives of 

 the club. They form one of the ffnest chapters of the most splendid 

 courage, fortitude, and endurance, under dire stress of circumstances, 

 that is to be found in the histor}" of Arctic explorations. 



In this journey I had determined conclusively the northern limit of 

 the Greenland Archipelago or land group, and had practically con- 

 nected the coast southward to Independence Bay, leaving only that 

 comparatively short portion of the peripherv of Greenland lying 

 between Independence Bay and Cape Bismarck indeterminate. The 

 nonexistence of land for a very considera))le distance to the northward 



