GREENLAND:—INHABITANTS. 
333 
We were not so fortunate as to meet with any 
human beings in a living state,—though the traces 
of their recent existence were innumerable. These 
traces consisted of numerous huts, hunting uten¬ 
sils, portions of sledges, hones that had been di¬ 
vided artificially, domestic implements, and depo¬ 
sitories of the dead, containing human skeletons, 
or even bodies, as I was informed, only partially 
decayed. In some instances, these relics were of 
such a nature, as to indicate a very recent deser¬ 
tion of the inhabitants. Such, in particular, was 
the intimation afforded by the fire-places contain¬ 
ing ashes, which we found at Cape Swainson and 
on Traill Island. These appeared to be the remains 
of recent fires, perhaps of the preceding spring or 
summer; for it is scarcely probable that the light 
ashes of wood and moss could have long resisted 
either being washed away by the melting of the 
snow, or scattered about by the violence of the 
tempests. There is another evidence, though of 
a collateral kind, that may be mentioned, which 
would, I conceive, almost of itself establish the 
opinion of the present existence of inhabitants 
upon this coast, were any further proof requisite. 
Captain Johan Haacke, of the ship Patriot Gleoj- 
stein, a Bremen whaler, found a dead sea-horse 
(walrus), in the summer of 1820, within sight ol 
the east coast of Greenland, in the latitude of 73°, 
