Page:Life with the Esquimaux - 1864 - Volume 2.djvu/203

184 "I asked my Innuit attendant to take the glass and ' tah-koo seko ' —look at the sea-ice. When Shevikoo had viewed it carefully, I asked him, ' Seko amasuit? ' —Do you see much ice? He replied, ' Noud-loo—noud-loo! ' —Yes—yes. From the deep, slow tones of his voice, as he answered me, I understood that he too was surprised at the sight. I wondered how a vessel was to get out of Field Bay; but the next instant I thought, 'Well, now, Captain B will find some way, of course, which my inexperienced self cannot discover, by which the George Henry can be put through that pack.' My thoughts were also of Captain Parker and his son, who had, each with a vessel, left about this time last year and proceeded home. "I took another prolonged look, before I left, at Davis's Strait. Monumental Island was white, and its sides presented no black rock peering out; and the same was true of Lady Franklin Island. The pack appeared very rough; much pinnacled ice was among it, and it was especially to be seen around the first island of the extreme land next Davis's Strait. As far as the eye could reach by the aid of the most excellent glass, up and down the strait, no open water met my view. I then turned to Kingaite. Miles on miles of mountain there were before me. A long line of black cloud stretched from the extreme south to the extreme north-west, just enveloping the tops of most of the Kingaite ridge. I was disappointed in not getting a sight of Oopungnewing and Niountelik; the ridge of another mountain, distant two miles, ran in such a direction as to hide them, but a small island near Oopungnewing was in sight. The termination of the grass plain, Kus-se-gear-ark-ju-a, opposite and near Niountelik, was within view. The little bay on the Frobisher Bay side, making up to within one mile of Field Bay, was nearly down beneath us. "On climbing this mountain my clothing became saturated with perspiration. On making the top the wind was blowing cuttingly cold, thus serving to chill me too hastily for comfort or for long endurance. Before I finished the observations I made up there, I came near freezing my fingers, and the time