[The Journey to the Polar Sea by John Franklin]@TWC D-Link book
The Journey to the Polar Sea

CHAPTER 6
13/53

Some altitudes of the Aurora Borealis were obtained.
We had a fine view at sunrise of the Basquiau Hill, skirting half the horizon with its white sides chequered by forests of pine.

It is seen from Pine Island Lake at the distance of fifty miles and cannot therefore be less than three-fourths of a mile in perpendicular height; probably the greatest elevation between the Atlantic Ocean and the Rocky Mountains.
A small stream runs near the hunting tent, strongly impregnated with salt.

There are several salt springs about it which are not frozen during the winter.
The surface of the snow, thawing in the sun and freezing at night, had become a strong crust which sometimes gave way in a circle round our feet, immersing us in the soft snow beneath.

The people were afflicted with snow blindness, a kind of ophthalmia occasioned by the reflection of the sun's rays in the spring.
The miseries endured during the first journey of this nature are so great that nothing could induce the sufferer to undertake a second while under the influence of present pain.

He feels his frame crushed by unaccountable pressure, he drags a galling and stubborn weight at his feet, and his track is marked with blood.


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