30 
Geology. 
tirely untrue, or that the advance of the ice was so ancient that 
the mountains have since recovered their angularity by meteoric 
degradation. The importance, therefore, of studying the entire 
coast line which we were to traverse, with a view to determining 
whether this angularity was a general feature or not, was fully 
appreciated, and observations were continued assiduously 
throughout the whole trip, going and coming, so far as the condi- 
tions of the voyage permitted. The interruptions due to fogs 
and darkness were considerable, but out of the something more 
than iioo miles of coast skirted, a sufficient proportion was ob- 
served to justify drawing inferences with a fair degree of assur- 
ance. 
It was found that the angularity was not a universal feature, 
but that it alternated with very considerable tracts of flowing 
outlines of glaciated aspect. All of the topography that was seen 
during the first and second days of our coasting was of the an- 
gular type. On the morning of the third day we found our- 
selves opposite a very pronounced transition. The coast south- 
ward was strongly serrate; that to the northward was as notably 
fluent. The latter type extended northward so far as could be 
seen during the forenoon of third day, but observation was much 
interrupted by fogs and was entirely cut of¥ during the afternoon. 
So much of the coast as was seen during the following day, south- 
ward from Disco Island, was of a similar flowing type, in the 
main, but not altogether. The western projection of the Nurg- 
suak Peninsula is of the rounded type. From Svarten Huk to 
the Devil’s Thumb, north of Upernavik, a portion of the contours 
are serrate, while other parts are subdued. There is no marked 
predominance of either class. The coast of Melville Bay is largely 
formed by the edge of the inland ice, which here comes down to 
the sea. The remainder is formed by promontories jutting out 
from the ice sheet like dormer windows, or by peaks projecting 
like islands through the great sheet of ice. The Devil’s Thumb 
and Melville Monument are rather slender rock columns, stand- 
ing but a few miles off the border of the present inland ice sheet. 
From Cape York northward to Inglefield Gulf, subdued con- 
