Horizontal Section, 20 feet circumference.
Vertical Section, 5 feet 6 inches high.
Casting off from the sledge, I had taken a short stroll by myself along one of the terraces which, with almost artificial regularity, swept around the base of the higher ground behind, when, to my astonishment, a mass of stone-work, and what at first looked exactly like a cairn, came in view; it required no spur to make me hasten to it, and to discover I was mistaken in supposing it to have been any thing constructed so recently as Franklin's visit. The ruin proved to be a conical-shaped building, the apex of which had fallen in. Its circumference, at the base, was about twenty feet, and the height of the remaining wall was five feet six inches. Those who had constructed it appeared well acquainted with the strength of an arched roof to withstand the pressure of the heavy falls of snow of these regions; and much skill and nicety was displayed in the arrangement of the slabs of slaty limestone, in order that the conical form of the building might be preserved throughout.
We removed the stones that had fallen into the building, but found nothing to repay our labour; indeed, from the quantity of moss adhering to the walls, and filling up the interstices of the masses which formed the edifice, I conjectured it was many years since it was constructed, though it would be impossible to guess when it was last inhabited; for, at Pond's Bay, I observed the remains of the native habitations to have the appearance of extreme old age and long abandonment, although, from the fresh seal-blubber cachés, there was not a doubt of the Esquimaux having been there the previous winter.
A mile beyond this ruin we halted for the night. Four of us (for, in Arctic travelling, officer and man are united by the common bond of labour) erected the tent over a space which we had cleared of the larger and rougher pieces of limestone, leaving what was called a soft spot as our castle and bedroom. One man, who dubbed himself cook for the day, with a mate, whose turn it would be to superintend the kitchen on the morrow, proceeded to cook the dinner. The cooking apparatus was a boat's stove, eighteen inches long, and nine inches broad, in which lignum vitæ was used as fuel.
Water having first to be made from ice and snow, and then boiled in the open air, the process was not an expeditious one, and I took my gun and struck inland; whilst Mr. May, in an opposite direction, made for a point of land to the westward.
A WINTER'S EVENING.