uck the tents, and Captain Lyon set off
to the southward, while we drove over to the lake, which is one mile
N.N.W. of the head of the creek, and, after three or four hours'
labour, completed a hole through the ice, which was very dark-coloured,
brittle, and transparent, and, as Toolemak had said, about five feet
thick. The water, which was eleven fathoms deep, flowed up within a
couple of inches of the surface, over which lay a covering of snow
eighteen inches in depth. In confident hope of now obtaining some fish,
we proceeded exactly according to Toolemak's instructions; but, after
four-and-twenty hours' trial at all depths, not even a single nibble
rewarded our labour.

Coasting the south shore, on which I wished to obtain observations and
angles for the survey, we the next day entered a small bay, where we
pitched our tent; our whole party being now so snow-blind with
endeavouring to distinguish the land from the ice (so entirely were both
covered with snow), that we could literally no longer muster one eye
among three of us to direct the sledge. I found a handkerchief tied
close, but not too tightly, round the eyes for a whole night, to be a
more effectual remedy for this disagreeable complaint than any
application of eyewater; and my companions being induced to try the same
experiment, derived equal benefit from it. Reaching Arlagnuk towards
evening of the 13th, we found that our parties had each thirty or forty
ducks ready for the ships; and that the Esquimaux had lately altogether
deserted this station, owing to the scarcity of walruses, and had
removed to Ooglit, where these animals were said to be abundant at this
season. Leaving our people on the morning of the 14th, I returned on
board soon after noon, where I found that nothing worthy of particular
notice had occurred during my absence.

On the 20th three or four other Esquimaux, strangers to us, arrived at
Igloolik from the northward, and we found from two young men who visited
us on the following day, that they came from _Too-n=o=o-nek_, a
place undoubtedly situated somewhere on the western coast of Baffin's
Bay, or about some of the inlets communicating with it, as they had
there seen several _Kabloona_ ships employed in killing whales. It is
not improbable, from the various accounts of the direction and distance
of Toonoonek, communicated by the Esquimaux through the usual medium of
their charts, that the part of the seacoast so named lies at no great