430 



SECOND VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 



year at Winter Island. The late mild weather having become an inconve- 

 *-*"y-w nience to Mr. Fisher at the Observatory, owing to the thaw that was going 

 on around it, we now pitched a tent for the reception of the instruments, 

 and Mr. Fisher's clock was soon after set up in it. 



Mon. 12. Among other useful purposes to which our dogs were put, they afforded an 

 opportunity of trying, on a more extensive scale than had before been done 

 at Winter Island, the experiment of laying sand upon the ice in order to assist 

 its dissolution. The sledge was therefore employed daily for a fortnight in 

 bringing sand from the shore, and lightly covering the ice with it in the di- 

 rection of the open sea. The space thus covered was twenty-four feet in 

 width, a narrow line having been before found to cover itself very frequently 

 with drift, and the extent accomplished was about two-thirds of a mile. The 

 effect produced by this will be mentioned hereafter. 



Wed. 14. Towards the middle of May, ten individuals of the Esquimaux who were 

 strangers to us, consisting of three men, four women, and three children, 

 arrived from Peelig, a station represented by them to be from six to ten days' 

 journey from Igloolik, but of whose situation we could never obtain any 

 very satisfactory information. A man named Toolooak, being the fourth in- 

 dividual of our acquaintance distinguished by that favourite appellation, 

 came to the ships on the 14th, accompanied as usual by some of the 

 others to introduce him. It appeared from what these people said, that the 

 Esquimaux at Peelig had received no intimation of our being here ; so that 

 none of the others had gone that way since our arrival : we gained no in- 

 formation of interest from the newly-arrived party. The parts of the land 

 which had been uncovered were now once more hidden from us by a fresh 

 coat of snow, and indeed the whole prospect had resumed, in every respect, 

 its winter appearance. 



Mon. 19. Some of our gentlemen, on going out on the 19th to Arlagnuk, where a 

 part of the Esquimaux still remained, found that that the open water had 

 now approached the shore there within three-quarters of a mile, and that 

 the ducks were more numerous than before. They succeeded in killing 

 some of these, and Ooi/arraseo, who proved a most active, intelligent, and 

 obliging young man, immediately carried down his canoe to try to pick them 

 up, but without success, the swell being so considerable at the margin of the 

 ice that, though he managed to launch her, he could not steady her suffi- 

 ciently to get into the hole. He explained at the same time, that in such 

 cases, and when very desirous of getting out, they sometimes lash two 



