e interior probably,
as the winds from in shore are cold. The crew found coal and dwarf
willow which they could burn; lemmings, ptarmigan, hares, reindeer, and
musk-oxen, which they could eat.
"Farewell to the land where I often have wended
My way o'er its mountains and valleys of snow;
Farewell to the rocks and the hills I've ascended,
The bleak arctic homes of the buck and the doe;
Farewell to the deep glens where oft has resounded
The snow-bunting's song, as she carolled her lay
To hillside and plain, by the green sorrel bounded,
Till struck by the blast of a cold winter's day."
There is a bit of description of Banks Land, from the anthology of that
country, which, so far as we know, consists of two poems by a seaman
named Nelson, one of Captain McClure's crew. The highest temperature
ever observed on this "gem of the sea" was 53 deg. in midsummer. The lowest
was 65 deg. below zero in January, 1853; that day the thermometer did not
rise to 60 deg. below, that month was never warmer than 16 deg. below, and the
average of the month was 43 deg. below. A pleasant climate to spend three
years in!
One day for talk was all that could be allowed, after Mr. Pim's amazing
appearance. On the 8th of April, he and his dogs, and Captain McClure
and a party, were ready to return to our friend the "Resolute." They
picked up Dr. Domville on the way; he had got the broken sledge mended,
and killed five musk-oxen, against they came along. He went on in the
dog-sledge to tell the news, but McClure and his men kept pace with
them; and he and Dr. Domville had the telling of the news together.
It was decided that the "Investigator" should be abandoned, and the
"Intrepid" and "Resolute" made room for her men. Glad greeting they gave
them too, as British seamen can give. More than half the crews were away
when the "Investigator's" parties came in, but by July everybody had
returned. They had found islands where the charts had guessed there was
sea, and sea where they had guessed there was land; had changed
peninsulas into islands and islands into peninsulas. Away off beyond the
seventy eighth parallel, Mr. McClintock had christened the farthest dot
of land "Ireland's Eye," as if his native island were peering off into
the unknown there;--a great island, which will be our farthest now, for
years to come, had been named "Prince Patrick's Land," in honor of the
baby prince who was the youngest when
|