On the morning of the 3d we passed some of the highest icebergs I
have ever seen, one of them being not less than one hundred and
fifty to two hundred feet above the sea, judging from the height
of the Griper's masts when near it.
The vegetation was tolerably luxuriant in some places upon the low
land which borders the sea, consisting principally of the
dwarf-willow, sorrel, saxifrage, and poppy, with a few roots of
scurvy-grass. There was still a great deal of snow remaining even
on the lower parts of the land, on which were numerous ponds of
water; on one of these, a pair of young red-throated divers, which
could not rise, were killed; and two flocks of geese, one of them
consisting of not less than sixty or seventy, were seen by Mr.
Hooper, who described them as being very tame, running along the
beach before our people, without rising, for a considerable
distance. Some glaucous gulls and plovers were killed, and we met
with several tracks of bears, deers, wolves, foxes, and mice. The
coxswain of the boat found upon the beach part of the bone of a
whale, which had been cut at one end by a sharp instrument like an
axe, with a quantity of chips lying about it, affording undoubted
proof of this part of the coast having been visited at no distant
period by Esquimaux; it is more than probable, indeed, that they
may inhabit the shores of this inlet, which time would not now
permit us to examine.
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