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the cutter was lowered & the Capt-Doctor. Muir, Reynolds & myself landed noon a stretch of shaly beach made up of crumbling black slate upon which in the ¼ mile of this beach lay strewn about a dozen drift logs varying from a few inches to one over 2 feet in diameter at base (this latter a spruce) Not a trace of former presence of man was to be found but to our surprise there lay strewn among the other drift wood the following articles showing mans handiwork - stumps of tree which had been cut with an ax, a small spar like a small boats mast - a piece of board such as pilot bread boxes are made of - two pieces of wood from some vessel both showing bolt holes, and a double bladed paddle of native make & the pattern of the few in use at Cape Waukarem and neighboring port of the Siberian coast. All these articles showed from their position that there were undoubtedly mere drift. The river empties by two mouths and stranded on the small gravelly islet between these lay the skeleton of a Right Whale. To each side of our landing the shore arose rapidly into cliffs of crumbling slate rock of curved & contorted narrow strata showing different shaded dark strata with a few light ones on the left making the strange curves & angles more striking here than elsewhere The country away from the shore arose in evenly rounded swelling hills becoming higher in the interior where however the hateful fog closed 

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