The wind abated after midnight and the surf diminished rapidly, which caused us to be on the alert at a very early hour on the 22nd, but we had to wait until six A.M. for the return of Augustus who had continued out all night on an unsuccessful pursuit of deer.  It appears that he had walked a few miles further along the coast than the party had done on the 18th and, from a sketch he drew on the sand, we were confirmed in our former opinion that the shore inclined more to the eastward beyond Point Turnagain.  He also drew a river of considerable size that discharges its waters into Walker’s Bay, on the banks of which stream he saw a piece of wood such as the Esquimaux use in producing fire, and other marks so fresh that he supposed they had recently visited the spot.  We therefore left several iron materials for them and, embarking without delay, prepared to retrace our steps.* Our men, cheered by the prospect of returning, showed the utmost alacrity and, paddling with unusual vigour, carried us across Riley’s and Walker’s Bays, a distance of twenty miles before noon, when we landed on Slate-clay Point as the wind had freshened too much to permit us to continue the voyage.  The whole party went to hunt but returned without success in the evening, drenched with the heavy rain which commenced soon after they had set out.  Several deer were seen but could not be approached in this naked country and, as our stock of pemmican did not admit of serving out two meals, we went dinnerless to bed.

(Footnote.  It is a curious coincidence that our Expedition left Point Turnagain on August 22—­on the same day that Captain Parry sailed out of Repulse Bay.  The parties were then distant from each other 539 miles.)

Soon after our departure this day a sealed tin-case, sufficiently buoyant to float, was thrown overboard, containing a short account of our proceedings and the position of the most conspicuous points.  The wind blew off the land, the water was smooth and, as the sea is in this part more free from islands than in any other, there was every probability of its being driven off the shore into the current which, as I have before mentioned, we suppose, from the circumstance of Mackenzie’s River being the only known stream that brings down the wood we have found along the shores, to set to the eastward.

August 23.

A severe frost caused us to pass a comfortless night.  At two P.M. we set sail and the men voluntarily launched out to make a traverse of fifteen miles across Melville Sound before a strong wind and heavy sea.  The privation of food under which our voyagers were then labouring absorbed every other terror; otherwise the most powerful persuasion could not have induced them to attempt such a traverse.  It was with the utmost difficulty that the canoes were kept from turning their broadsides to the waves, though we sometimes steered with all the paddles.  One of them narrowly escaped being overset by this accident, which occurred in a mid-channel where the waves were so high that the masthead of our canoe was often hid from the other, though it was sailing within hail.