22nd.--One of the old Esquimaux at the fishery speared a seal on the ice near the edge of the open water, but it got away in consequence of the line breaking. Their mode of approaching the seal requires much patience and is very fatiguing, as the hunter must lie flat on his face or on his side, and advance towards the seal by a series of motions resembling those of the animal itself. He has frequently to proceed in this way some hundred yards, but so well does he act his part that he can get within a few feet of his object, and a looker-on would find much difficulty in telling which was the man and which the seal. The seal actually comes to meet the hunter, who, as soon as it has got some distance from its hole, springs up and intercepts its return. The women are very expert at this mode of hunting, and frequently having no spear, use a small club of wood with which they strike the seal on the nose. The greater part of the Esquimaux were encamped about a quarter of a mile from us, and had a _concert_ every night,--a union of the vocal and the instrumental. Their only musical instrument is a sort of drum or tambourine, consisting of a stout wooden hoop, about 30 inches in diameter, round which, when it is to be used, a wet parchment deer skin is stretched. In beating this rough instrument, the hoop, not the skin, is struck. The performer being in the centre of the tent, keeps turning slowly round, whilst four or five women add their voices to the execrable sound, producing among them most horrible discord. Each of the men in his turn takes up the drum and thumps away till he is tired, when he lays it down and another takes his place, and so on it goes until it has passed through the hands of all the males of the party, including the boys. The whole of the natives, with the exception of a few old people who were remaining at the fishing station, and three young men and their wives, went the following day to an island four miles off for the purpose of killing more seals, and also to put new covers on their canoe frames. 25th.--This was the anniversary of our arrival here last year; and certainly everything wore a very different aspect from what it then did. Last summer at this date there was no ice to be seen in Repulse Bay; the snow had nearly all disappeared, and the various streams had shrunk to their lowest level. _Now_ there was not a pool of water in the bay, except where the entrance of a river or creek had worn away or broken up the ice for a short distance. There was much snow on the ground in many places, and most of the streams were still deep and rapid. The musquitoes were rather troublesome; but this I was not sorry for, as the Esquimaux said that the ice in the bay would soon break up after these tormentors made their appearance.