. Arctic explorations: the second Grinnell expedition in search of Sir John Franklin, 1853, '54, '55. when passing Northumber-land Island, that some of its glacier-slopes were mar-gined with verdure, an almost unfailing indication ofanimal life; and, as my men were much wasted bydiarrhoea, and our supplies of food had become scanty,I resolved to work my way to the island and recruitthere for another effort. Tracking and sometimes rowing through a heavyrain, we traversed the leads for two days, workingeastward; and on the morning of the third gained theopen water near the shore. Here a breeze c
. Arctic explorations: the second Grinnell expedition in search of Sir John Franklin, 1853, '54, '55. when passing Northumber-land Island, that some of its glacier-slopes were mar-gined with verdure, an almost unfailing indication ofanimal life; and, as my men were much wasted bydiarrhoea, and our supplies of food had become scanty,I resolved to work my way to the island and recruitthere for another effort. Tracking and sometimes rowing through a heavyrain, we traversed the leads for two days, workingeastward; and on the morning of the third gained theopen water near the shore. Here a breeze came to ouraid, and in a couple of hours more we passed with nowunwonted facility to the southern face of the met several flocks of little auks as we approached NORTHUMBERLAND ISLAND. 333 it, and found on landing that it was one enormoushomestead of the auks, dovekies, and gulls. We encamped on the 31st, on a low beach at the footof a moraine that came down between precipitous cliffsof surpassing wildness. It had evidently been selectedby the Esquimaux for a winter settlement: five well-. NORTHUMBERLAND ISLAND. built huts of stone attested this. Three of them werestill tolerably perfect, and bore marks of recent habita-tion. The droppings of the birds had fertilized thesoil, and it abounded in grasses, sorrel, and cochlearia,to the waters edge. The foxes were about in greatnumbers, attracted, of course, by the abundance ofbirds. They were all of them of the lead-coloredvariety, without a white one among them. The young 334 NORTHUMBERLAND GLACIER. ones, as yet lean and seemingly unskilled in hospitablecourtesies, barked at us as we walked about. I was greatly interested by a glacier that occupiedthe head of the moraine. It came down abruptly from
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