PLANTING THE FLAG.
It now only remained for us to plant our flag in
token of our discovery, and to deposit a record in
proof of our presence. The flags[1] were tied to the
whip-lash, and suspended between two tall rocks, and
while we were building a cairn, they were allowed to
flutter in the breeze; then, tearing a leaf from my
note-book, I wrote on it as follows:—
"This point, the most northern land that has ever been reached,
was visited by the undersigned, May 18th, 19th, 1861, accompanied
by George F. Knorr, traveling with a dog-sledge. We arrived here
after a toilsome march of forty-six days from my winter harbor,
near Cape Alexander, at the mouth of Smith Sound. My observations
place us in latitude 81° 35´, longitude 70° 30´, W. Our further
progress was stopped by rotten ice and cracks. Kennedy
Channel appears to expand into the Polar Basin; and, satisfied that
it is navigable at least during the months of July, August, and September,
I go hence to my winter harbor, to make another trial to
get through Smith Sound with my vessel, after the ice breaks up
this summer.
"I. I. Hayes.
"May 19th, 1861."
This record being carefully secured in a small glass
vial, which I brought for the purpose, it was deposited
beneath the cairn; and then our faces were turned
homewards. But I quit the place with reluctance.
- ↑ These were a small United States flag (boat's ensign), which had been carried in the South Sea Expedition of Captain Wilkes, U. S. N., and afterwards in the Arctic Expeditions of Lieut. Comg. DeHaven and Dr. Kane; a little United States flag which had been committed to Mr. Sonntag by the ladies of the Albany Academy; two diminutive Masonic flags intrusted to me,—one by the Kane Lodge of New York, the other by the Columbia Lodge of Boston; and our Expedition signal-flag, bearing the Expedition emblem, the Pole Star—a crimson star, on a white field—also a gift from fair hands. Being under the obligation of a sacred promise to unfurl all of these flags at the most northern point attained, it was my pleasing duty to carry them with me—a duty rendered none the less pleasing by the circumstance that, together, they did not weigh three pounds.
