The Ripley left its anchorage at American Harbor or Natashquan on June 28, and stood out to sea, their usual recourse to avoid the intricacies of the coast. After proceeding fifty miles or more they touched at numerous islands, where Guillemots, Puffins, and Black-backed Gulls were breeding in vast numbers, and managed to anchor safely, in spite of that "ignorant ass" of a pilot, at a wild and desolate point which a recent traveler has identified as the harbor of Wapitagun.[36] July the second was such a beautiful day for Labrador that Audubon went on shore, where he drew this vivid picture of that desolate land in sunshine:[37]
The country, so wild and grand, is of itself enough to interest any one in its wonderful dreariness. Its mossy, gray-clothed rocks, heaped and thrown together as if by chance, in the most fantastical groups imaginable, huge masses hanging on minor ones as if about to roll themselves down from their doubtful-looking situations, into the depths of the sea beneath. Bays without end, sprinkled with rocky islands of all shapes and sizes, where in every fissure a Guillemot, a Cormorant, or some other wild bird retreats to secure its egg, and raise its young, or save itself from the hunter's pursuit. The peculiar cast of the sky, which never seems to be certain, butterflies flitting over snow-banks, probing beautiful dwarf flowerets of many hues [that are] pushing their tender stems from the thick bed of moss which everywhere covers the granite rocks. Then the morasses, wherein you plunge up to your knees, or the walking over the stubborn, dwarfish shrubbery, making one think that as he goes he treads down the forests of Labrador. The unexpected Bunting, or perhaps Sylvia, which perchance, and indeed as if by chance alone, you now and then see flying before you, or hear singing from the creeping plants of the ground. The beautiful fresh water lakes, on the ragged crests of greatly elevated islands, wherein the Red and Black-necked Divers swim as proudly as swans do in other latitudes, and where the fish appear to have been cast as strayed beings from the surplus food of the ocean. All—all is wonderfully grand, wild—aye, and terrific. And yet how beautiful it is now, when one sees the wild bee, moving from one flower to another in search of food, which doubtless is as sweet to it, as the essence of the magnolia is to those of favored Louisiana. The little Ring Plover rearing its delicate and tender young, the Eider Duck swimming man-of-war-like amid her floating brood, like the guardship of a most valuable convoy; the White-crowned Bunting's sonorous note reaching the ear ever and anon; the crowds of sea-birds in search of places wherein to repose or to feed: how beautiful is all this in this wonderful rocky desert at this season, the beginning of July, compared with the horrid blasts of winter which here predominate by the will of God, when every rock is rendered smooth with snows so deep that every step the traveller takes is as if entering into his grave; for even should he escape an avalanche, his eye dreads to search the horizon, for full well does he know that snow,—snow, is all that can be seen. I watched the Ring Plover for some time; the parents were so intent on saving their young that they both lay on the rocks as if shot, quivering their wings and dragging their bodies as if quite disabled. We left them and their young to the care of the Creator. I would not have shot one of the old ones, or taken one of the young for any consideration, and I was glad my young men were as forbearing.
Plate CXI
Pileated Woodpecker,
PICUS PILEATUS, Linn.
Adult Male, 1. Adult Female, 2. Young Males, 3. 4. Racoon Grape. Vitis astivalis.
Drawn from nature by J. J. Audubon, F.R.S. F.L.S. Engraved, Printed & Coloured by R. Havell.
On the 6th of July he wrote:[38]
By dint of hard work and rising at three, I have drawn a Colymbus septemtrionalis [Great Northern Diver] and a young one, and nearly finished a Ptarmigan; this afternoon, however, at half-past five, my fingers could no longer hold my pencil, and I was forced to abandon my work and go ashore for exercise. The fact is that I am growing old too fast; alas! I feel it,—and yet work I will, and may God grant me life to see the last plate of my mammoth work finished.
On the seventh there is this note: