Page:Narrative of the Discoveries on the North Coast of America.djvu/312

282 this morning went south about the island, whidi occupied eight hours' incessant rowing. Then crossing the strait, which is three miles wide, we landed to breafast at Point Everitt. The ice obstructed our passage round this cape, after which we had a clear channel to Fisher's Islands, where we encamped at 9 P. M., having come thirty-five miles. The last of Barry Islands affords a fine illustration of the secondary resting upon the primitive rocks. The horizontal line of stratification appeared as accurately drawn as in a work of art. At the precipice from whose face I took away specimens, there were about twenty feet of the base rock above the sea, with eighty feet of trap cliff superimposed. Others doubled these dimensions. Point Everitt, and the whole range of the mainland to Melville Sound, are formed of bare rounded granitic hills of inferior altitude, while all the adjacent islands present a mixed geological character.

Our progress on the 5th was not much impeded till we reached Cape Croker, where the ice was squeezed upon the shore, and obliged us to make a portage. We had a view of Melville Sound quite covered with ice, but an almost clear channel luckily stretched across its entrance to a low island, four or five miles distant; the northern side of which being shut up,