ached a small recess, just as they came in
contact, and they recoiled sufficiently to leave a passage for her exit,
after she had sustained the trifling damage of a few cracks in the upper
planks. The rays of the sun, and the waves acting on the surface of the
floes, had, by thawing them irregularly, formed lakes of fresh water of
some extent upon their surface. When these pieces of water were of
sufficient depth, we availed ourselves of them to make some progress in
our voyage, and in this way we frequently sailed over a considerable
thickness of ice.

At four o'clock P.M. we had advanced five miles, when to our joy we
found a lane of open water, which permitted us to cross to the other
side of the bay, where we encamped in latitude 68 degrees 51-1/2 minutes
N., and longitude 116 degrees 03 minutes W., having sailed in the course
of the day eighteen miles and a half. The bay was named Stapylton in
honour of Major-General the Honourable G.A.C. Stapylton, Chairman of the
Victualling Board; and on ascending a rising ground we perceived that it
communicates with a long, narrow lake. A few miles from the coast the
land rises from three to five hundred feet above the sea, and presents
many precipitous limestone cliffs, and chains of small lakes. The
country is very barren, the only plant we gathered being the yellow
poppy, (_papaver nudicaule_.) By our reckoning we were now nearly in the
longitude of the mouth of the Coppermine River, but about seventy miles
to the northward of it, we, therefore, entertained an opinion that we
were coasting a narrow peninsula, and that we should soon have the
pleasure of perceiving the coast take a southerly direction. It was,
consequently, with some hopes of beholding the sea on the opposite side
of the peninsula that I walked seven or eight miles to the eastward in
the night, but I was disappointed. In my way I had occasion to wade
through a small lake, when two birds, about the size of the _northern
diver_, and apparently of that genus, swam, with bold and angry
gestures, to within a few yards of me, evidently very impatient of any
intruder on their domain. Their necks were of a beautiful pale yellow
colour, their bodies black with white specks. I considered them to
belong to a species not yet described, and regretted that, having left
my gun at the tent, it was not in my power to procure one of them for a
specimen.

[Sidenote: Friday, 4th.] Embarking at three A.M. on the 4th, we found