A WINTER HOUSE. 125 



placed near together and covered with birch and hemlock 

 bark, the strips, which were a foot wide, being placed 

 crosswise; the eaves were scarcely five feet above the 

 ground, and the floor was in part of boards and in part of 

 turf. The door, hung on iron hinges, and closed with a 

 wooden latch and string, was only four and a half feet 

 high, and there was a single window, 16X15 inches. 

 Within were three beds and a settle. The lumber for 

 these shanties had evidently, by the piles of sawdust near 

 by, been sawn upon the spot and taken from the Labra- 

 dorian forest of firs near at hand, which measured twelve 

 inches through at the butt, and were about twenty feet 

 high. In their branches a robin and a sparrow were flit- 

 ting about. The willow bushes were here five feet 

 in height. On the sides of the sandy terraces were 

 blackberry and raspberry bushes, and currants, shadber- 

 ries, and golden thread just in blossom, while the alders 

 were still in flower. 



I dredged in wa|er about fifty fathoms deep, in 

 Chateau Bay, bringing up, among molluscs, fine large 

 Leda pernula, Astarte banksii, Lyonsia arenosa, Car- 

 dium islandicum ; rare sandstars, and young and old 

 arctic crabs {Chionc^cetes opilio). 



The 28th was almost wintry in its cold, changeable 

 weather. A northeast storm raged, with a few drops of 

 rain and a little snow in the forenoon, while after dinner 

 there was a thick snow-storm, the hill-tops being whit- 

 ened with snow for several hours, which, however, disap- 

 peared by the evening. The water in the harbor was 

 intensely cold, and the Mertensia and Clione, those 

 beautiful creatures of the icy seas, abounded. 



The forenoon was spent-in examining the trap rocks 



