184 } National Geographic Magazine. 
during this time off Tangent point, and by this time we had also 
demonstrated the uselessness of Little Joe Tuckfield as an ice 
pilot or prophet. The winds were very light and we had now 
gotton out of the strong northeast current running off Point 
Barrow. On the night of the 9th we passed off the north of the 
Colville river, the water offshore becoming very muddy. 
The first important error found in the charts and maps of this 
region was found here by the observation of the non-existence of 
the Pelly mountains. This observation was confirmed upon our 
return by the concurrent testimony of the whaling masters Who 
had cruised here, and the natives who hunt in the neighborhood. 
The mountains certainly do not exist where placed by the charts, 
and I judge that some small hummocks near the beach were 
mistaken for a far off range of mountains, when Dease and 
Simpson first explored this coast in 1837. 
Early on the morning of the 10th of August we sighted the 
first steam whaler, and as we steamed toward her we skirted along 
some long low islands parallel to the coast line and stretching 
from the Return reef of Sir John Franklin to the mouth of the 
Colville river. The islands, one being about three miles long, 
are not shown upon the charts, and not having any known names 
were designated as the Thetis islands. 
The steam-whaler was found to be the Baleena, <catnianced by 
Captain Everett Smith, one of the most intelligent of the whale- 
men of the Arctic. He was anchored off Return reef, which he was 
enabled definitely to locate by the traditions of the natives. It 
was at this point that Sir John Franklin, in one of his earliest 
boat journeys, was obliged to turn back while endeavoring to 
explore the coast from Mackenzie bay to Point Barrow. After 
a long interview with Captain Smith, from which I gathered much 
information as to the ice-conditions and the probable positions of 
the steam-whalers to the eastward, he returned on board of his 
ship, and the good ship Thetis once more turned her head to the 
eastward. 
Soon afterwards another toni whaler was sighted, made fast 
by ice-anchors to an ice-floe; we did not stop, but, exchanging 
colors, proceeded on our way. ‘The ice seemed to be getting 
thicker, and shortly afterwards a third whaler was sighted, at 
anchor off a small low island, with apparently heavy ice ahead. 
As the weather seemed uncertain I determined to anchor for the 
night in the vicinity of the island. 
