52 



SECOND VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 



/Wust ^ iat ^ e nat * ves nac * occupied this station during a part of the same season ; 

 and judging from the number of circles collected in this place, and still more 

 from our subsequent knowledge of these people, it is probable that not less 

 than one hundred and twenty persons had taken up their residence here 

 at the same time. 



The land on the northern and western sides of Repulse Bay does not 

 exceed six or seven hundred feet in height, while that on the south rises, 

 perhaps, full a thousand feet above the level of the sea. The shore on 

 which we landed is composed of gneiss rock, traversed by broad veins of red 

 feldspar running in almost every direction. Quartz and mica also occurred 

 in separate masses, as well as white limestone lying in loose fragments 

 on the surface. Before we landed in the morning the snow which fell 

 the preceding day had quite disappeared from the north shore, and by 

 noon the land all round the bay had resumed its dark appearance. We 

 saw several rein-deer and hares, some ducks, dovekies, knots, (tri?iga 

 cinerea,) snow buntings, and a white owl. An ermine, (erminea mustela,) 

 a few ptarmigans, and a hare, were killed. Mice, {mm hudsonius ,) were 

 very abundant, particularly among the stones of the Esquimaux tents. I 

 do not know whether the seals' flesh remaining on some of the bones was 

 any attraction to them, but it is certain that two of them being put to- 

 gether into a cage, the larger killed the other and eat a part of it. Several 

 black whales were seen in the bay in the course of the day. There was here 

 no want of vegetation, which indeed was in many parts extremely luxu- 

 riant ; and specimens of every plant were carefully preserved by our nume- 

 rous collectors. 



The latitude observed on shore was 66° 30' 58", being the first observation 

 we had yet obtained so near the Arctic Circle, but far to the southward of 

 that given by Captain Middleton *. The longitude, by chronometers, was 

 86° 30' 20" ; the dip of the magnetic needle, 88° 07' 28" ; and the variation 

 48° 32' 57" westerly ; being only a degree and a half less than that observed 

 by Middleton in 1742. In observations formerly made upon the variation of 



* The difference amounts to about twenty miles. It is but justice, however, to the me- 

 mory of Captain Middleton to add, that several miles of this error may have been occasioned 

 by the imperfection of nautical instruments in his day, combined with the unavoidable inac- 

 curacy of observations made by the horizon of the sea, when encumbered with much ice. 

 On this latter account, as well as from the extraordinary terrestrial refraction, no observation 

 can be here depended upon, unless made with an artificial horizon. 



