AECTIC VOYAGES. 
75 
sandstone. The ends, which project from seven to ten inches, are, for the greater part* 
broken. The whole has the appearance of a ruinous dike,’ Lieutenant Anjou, who 
likewise examined those Wood Hills, says ; 1 They are merely a steep declivity, twenty 
fathoms high, extending about five wersts along the coast. In this bank, which is ex¬ 
posed to the sea, beams or trunks of trees are found, generally in a horizontal position, 
but with great irregularity, fifty or more of them together, the largest being about ten 
inches in diameter. The wood is not very hard, is friable, has a black colour, and a slight 
gloss. When laid on the fire it does not burn with a flame, but glimmers, and emits a 
resinous odour.’ 
“ I have also observed in one of the Parliamentary Blue Books, that a travelling 
party from H.M.S. ‘ Resolute,’ when at Melville Island, on their return journey after ex¬ 
ploring Prince Patrick’s Island in 1854, discovered the trunks of trees embedded in a 
white sandy soil, on the same meridian as that of those discovered by us, but two de¬ 
grees further north. One was four feet in circumference and thirty feet long, and another 
two feet, ten inches in diameter; with several parts of similar trees just showing above the 
soil. Thus establishing a fact no less important than interesting, that throughout the 
wide extent of the Polar Sea, as far as observation has enabled us to determine, there ex¬ 
isted at one period various and luxuriant forms of arborescent growth, in regions where 
nothing is now to be seen but desolate lands and trackless ice wastes.”— Armstrong , 
p. 396. 
The drift wood of the Siberian coast is supplied by the great Asiatic 
rivers, which flow north into the Polar Sea, and the Mackenzie and 
Copper-mine Rivers of America doubtless also contribute their share. 
At some remote pre-historical, though recent geological period, when 
the islands of the Parry group were some 500 feet lower than at present, 
the drift wood was carried, as at present, from the west to the east, and 
deposited in great quantity pn the then western shores of the Parry Is¬ 
lands; and the fact that it has only been found in the western islands of 
these seas is a proof that, in that period, as at present, there was some 
obstacle to its further passage eastward. Row, as we have supposed the 
land to have been 500 or 600 feet lower than at present, the straits 
were probably more open than now, and, therefore, the obstacle to the 
currents eastward must have been in the sea itself. We think the 
impediment was the Atlantic Tide, which then, as now, met at these 
points the Polar and Pacific Tides, causing still or slack water at the 
head of the tide, and so producing the rapid accumulation of drift wood 
upon the western shores of the American Polar islands. 
This view of the origin of the beds of drift wood is confirmed by the 
fact, mentioned by Dr. Armstrong, that floating logs of drift timber 
were met by the “ Investigator” in the sea to the west of Banks’ Land. 
Some interesting, though not very precise information, respecting the 
geological structure of Banks’ Land and Prince Albert’s Land, is given 
by M‘Clure and Armstrong. Prom M‘Clintock’s and M‘Clure spe¬ 
cimens of coal, preserved in the Museum of the Royal Dublin Society, 
and brought from Cape Hamilton and Cape Dundas respectively, it 
would appear as if the series of coal-beds which extend from Bathurst 
Island through Byam Martin’s Island, and the whole south of Mel¬ 
ville Island, were prolonged at the other side of the channel, into the 
north-east region of Banks’ Land. 
In the Princess Royal Islands, Captain M'Clure found nodules of 
