June-October 1881, Cruise of the Corwin, Part II Image 23

• Main Author: Muir, John
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Scholarly Commons 1881
• Subjects: John Muir; journals; drawings; writings; travel; journaling; naturalist; Arctic; Aleutian Islands
• Online Access: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmj-all/2025; https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/context/jmj-all/article/3024/type/native/viewcontent/fullsize.jpg

to account for faunal and vegetal distribution as it is found to exist to-day, were left out, land communication in any case undoubtedly existed, just previous to the glacial period, as far south as the Aleutian Islands, and northward to a point beyond the mouth of the Strait. While groping in the dense fogs that hang over this region, sailors find their way at times by the flight of the innumerable sea-birds that come and go from the sea to the shore. The direction of the land is a least, indicated, which in the case of a small islands, is very important. How the birds find their way is a mystery. This canoe alongside was “two sleeps” in making the passage. Time, is reckoned by sleeps. I suppose, during summer as there is no night and only day. They at once began to trade eagerly, seeming to fear that the whalers have all gone to the Arctic they would be left unvisited. In the forenoon after the natives had left, we took advantage of the calm weather to go in search of the wrecked Lolito, which went ashore last fall a few miles to the N of here. On the way we passed through a good deal of ice in flat cakes that had been formed in a deep still bay, sheltered from floating ice which jambs and packs it. This ice did not seem to be more than 2 or 3 feet thick, possibly the depth to which it froze last winter less the amount melted and evaporated since spring commenced. https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmj-all/3024/thumbnail.jpg