Page:Narrative of the Discoveries on the North Coast of America.djvu/401

ON MONTREAL ISLAND. scarcely extract "a kettle-full" out of it to celebrate the grand event of the day. As for the minor articles, Mr. Dease and I took possession of them, as memorials of our having breakfasted on the identical spot where the tent of our gallant, though less successful, precursor stood that very day five years before.

Finding it impossible to reconcile Back's longitude of the Montreal Island with that assigned by Franklin to Point Turnagain, I have adhered to my own observations, which agree closely with the latter. The longitude of the island will thus be 96° 24′ 45″ instead of 95° 18′ 15″; and the extent of our discoveries be diminished by about twenty-five miles.

All the objects for which the expedition was so generously instituted were now accomplished, but Mr. Dease and myself were not quite satisfied. We had determined the northern limits of America to the westward of the Great Fish River; it still remained a question whether Boothia Felix might not be united to the continent, on the other side of the estuary. The men, who had never dreamed of going any further, were therefore summoned, and the importance of proceeding some distance to the eastward explained to them; when, to their honour, all assented without a murmur. A fog that had 2 B 2