Page:A Wild-Goose Chase - Balmer - 1915.djvu/165

Rh think this coast runs down to Coronation Gulf, which cuts off the south end of this land from the continent. I make our present position about four hundred miles north of the Arctic Circle. This land's so big that if Hedon got south of where we've been looking he'd have brought up here. He knew, of course, that some of Amundsen's men in 1904, when they were making the Northwest Passage, found Eskimos a couple of hundred miles below here. He knew Stefansson crossed the southwest end of the island and found more Eskimos; also shot caribou and saw big herds coming from the north. If the beasts have been about here they're moving out now; so if we want fresh meat we can't get after them too quick."

"It's like this farther south?" Latham inquired.

The skipper stooped and pulled some moss from under the snow. It was similar to that which they had seen on Mason Island and other shores which they had searched for cairns.

"There's your turf, underbrush and forests of Victoria Land," McNeal said. "That's about all you'll find from one end of this land