TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION E. 809 



of mountains either eternally snow-clad, or covered with an ice-cap. The fiords 

 presented to the eye nothing hut hroad, level expanses of snow and ice, being 

 devoid of any marked ice-foot, floe-bergs, pressed-up hummocks, or any other indi- 

 cations tending to prove their direct connection with the Spitzhergen sea. In 

 general the immediate coast was high, rugged, and precipitous. The formation was 

 very like that around Discovery Harbour, schistose slate with a sprinkling of 

 quartz. Vegetation resembled closely that of Grinnell Land ; among specimens 

 brought back, the Arctic poppy and several saxifrages were identified. Aoove the 

 eighty-third parallel traces of the polar bear, the lemming, and the Arctic fox were 

 seen, and a hare and a ptarmigan killed. At the farthest north a snow bunting was 

 heard. A remarkable fact noted was the existence of a tidal crack — so called for 

 lack of better name — which extended from Cape Bryant along the entire coast, run- 

 ning across the various fiords in a direct fine, from headland to headland, and varying 

 from one yard to several hundred yards in width. Inside the crack the rough and 1 

 hummocky ice was but rarely seen, while outside prevailed the paleocrystic ice 

 over which Commander Markham struggled so manfully and successfully in hi3 

 wonderful journey of 1876. Midway between Capes May and Britannia a sounding 

 was made, but no bottom found at 1,800 feet: apparently no current existed. Ic 

 may he well to state that the latitude of the farthest north — Lockwood Island- 

 was determined by a set of circum-meridian and sub-polar observations, which 

 were reduced by Gauss's method. The latitude of Cape Britannia and several 

 other points was determined by circum-meridian observations. It affords the author 

 pleasure to testify to the accuracy of Lieutenant Beaumont's maps. The only 

 correction made places Cape Britannia a few miles south and Cape May a few miles 

 west of their assigned positions. These points were located by Lieutenant Beau- 

 mont from bearings, and his comparative exactness was remarkable considering the 

 disadvantages under which he laboured. 



The author then continues the account of his exploration as follows : — 

 ' The journeys made by Lieutenant Lockwood and myself across Grinnell Land, 

 and into its interior, revealed striking and peculiar physical conditions which have 

 been hitherto unsuspected. Between the heads of Archer and Greely fiords, a. 

 distance of some seventy miles, stretches the perpendicular front of an immense 

 ice-cap, which follows closely from east to west the eighty-first parallel. Its- 

 average height was not less than 150 feet. The undulations of the surface of the 

 ice conformed closely to the configuration of the country, so that the variations ira 

 the thickness of the ice-cap were inconsiderable. In about sixty miles but two- 

 places were found where slope and face were so modified as to render an ascent of 

 the ice possible. This ice-cap extending southward, covers Grinnell Land almost 

 entirely from the eighty-first parallel to Hayes Sound, and from Kennedy Channel 

 westward to Greely Fiord and the polar ocean. The glacier discharging into- 

 Dobbin Bay is but an offshoot of this ice-cap, and without doubt glaciers are to be- 

 found at the head of every considerable valley debouching into Richardson,Scoresby,. 

 or other bays. Several valleys which were visited during the retreat southward! 

 displayed at their entrances evident signs of such occupancy in the past. In July 

 I was fortunate enough to ascend Mount Arthur, the summit of which is 4,500' 

 feet, above the sea. The day was very clear. To the northward of the Garfield 

 Range a similar ice-cap appeared to view, from which extensive glaciers were pro- 

 jected through every mountain gap. One of these, the Henrietta Nasmith glacier,, 

 had been visited by me the preceding April, and was found to have a perpendicular 

 face of about 200 feet ; it discharged into a small bay. A part of Lake Hazelginman, 

 Abbe, and other glaciers feed streams which empty into that lake. Similarly, 

 glaciers were found at the head of rivers discharging into Saint Patrick, Lincoln, and 

 Basil Norris Bays, and Discovery Harbour. From these indications I estimate the 

 northern ice-cap of Grinnell Land as not far from 6,000 miles in area. Its 

 southern limit closely coincides with the eighty-second parallel. The country 

 between the eighty-first and eighty-second parallels, extending from Kennedy and 

 Robeson Channels to the western polar ocean, was found in July to be entirely free 

 from snow, except on the very backbone. In over 150 miles' travel icto the interior 

 my foot never touched snow. 



