OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 
51 
as a quantity of the dung of rein-deer was brought on board, the interior of 1819 . 
the country cannot be altogether unproductive. One or two specimens of the 
silvery gull, (Larus Argentatus), and of the Larus Glaucus, with the young of 
the latter alive, were obtained by Captain Sabine ; and five black whales 
were seen near the beach. 
Lieutenant Beechey found that the land, which at this time formed the 
western extreme, and which lies on the side of the bay, opposite to 
Cape Riley, was an island ; to which I, therefore, gave the name of Beechey 
Island, out of respect to Sir William Beechey. Immediately off Cape Riley 
runs a low point, which had some appearance of shoal-water near it, 
there being a strong ripple on the surface ; but Lieutenant Hoppner re- 
ported, that he could find no bottom with thirty-nine fathoms, at the distance 
of two hundred yards from it. 
As soon as the boats returned, all sail was made to the westward, where 
the prospect began to wear a more and more interesting appearance. We 
soon perceived, as we proceeded, that the land, along which we were 
sailing, and which, with the exception of some small inlets, had appeared 
to be hitherto continuous from Baffin’s Bay, began now to trend much 
to the northward, beyond Beechey island, leaving a large open space be- 
tween that coast and the distant land to the westward, which now appeared 
like an island, of which the extremes to the north and south were distinctly 
visible. The latter was a remarkable headland, having at its extremity two small 
table hills, somewhat resembling boats turned bottom upwards, and was named 
Cape Hotham, after Rear-Admiral the Honourable Sir Henry Hotham, one of 
the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, At sunset we had a clear and 
extensive view to the northward, between Cape Hotham and the eastern 
land. On the latter several headlands were discovered and named ; between 
the northernmost of these, called Cape Bowden, and the island to the west- 
ward, there was a channel of more than eight leagues in width, in which 
neither land nor ice could be seen from the mast-head. To this noble 
channel I gave the name of Wellington, after his Grace the Master-General 
of the Ordnance. The arrival off this grand opening was an event for which 
we had long been looking with much anxiety and impatience ; for, the con- 
tinuity of land to the northward had always been a source of uneasiness to 
us, principally from the possibility that it might take a turn to the southward 
and unite with the coast of America. The appearance of this broad 
opening, free from ice, and of the land on each side of it, more especially 
