American Whaleboats in Roes Welcome.
A Greenland Iceberg.
CHAPTER III.
SUMMER CRUISE OF THE NEPTUNE IN 1904.
HUDSON BAY.
The anchor was hoisted and the moorings to the ice cast off at two o’clock on the morning of the 18th of July, when the Neptune proceeded to break her way out of Fullerton harbour, after having been nine months there fast frozen in the ice. Little difficulty was experienced in breaking the harbour ice, when, following a pilot boat, the narrow eastern entrance was soon passed and the ship was once more free. Loose stringers of small ice extended a few miles from the shore, after which only occasional lumps were seen during the day, as the ship steamed across to Cape Kendall, and then followed the west coast of Southampton southward. The southwest point of the island was passed before midnight. This point lies well to the northward of its position on the chart, or in about 63° N. latitude.
The low southern shore of Southampton was followed during the night, and only a few stringers of ice were met with. At four o’clock in the morning the island was lost to sight, and by noon we were steaming along the equally low shores of Coats island, with the small but prominent Walrus island in sight to the northward. Ice to the northward gradually forced the ship closer to the shores of Coats, where, after passing a wide bay, partly filled with large, low islands, we coasted within two miles of a prominent headland about four hundred feet high, which forms the northeast cape of Coats, and which was named Cape Préfontaine in honour of the Honourable the Minister of Marine and Fisheries. These highlands appear to traverse the island diagonally in a southwest direction, coming out at a lower altitude on the south side of the island several miles west of Cape Pembroke. This ridge is due to a band of crystalline rocks, which rises from beneath the low flat limestones forming the remainder of the island. A large whale was seen while passing through Fisher strait.
Beyond Cape Préfontaine the ice became more plentiful, and many large pans were met with. The ice had the appearance of being lately broken up, and owing to its smooth unrafted condition we judged it came from Fisher strait, rather than from Fox channel to the northward. During the night this ice forced the ship southward into the channel between Coats and Mansfield, so that the western shore of the latter was reached some twenty-five miles to the south of its northern end.
Open leads in the ice were found from three to five miles from that island, and no difficulty was experienced in gaining its north end. This island of limestone is somewhat higher than Coats and Southampton, rising inland in low broad terraces to an elevation of upwards of a hundred feet. Small patches of snow were seen under banks and along the faces of the terraces, but elsewhere the green colour showed that considerable vegetation covered the greater part of its surface.