AFTER a brief rest our explorers continued their voyage. They warped the vessel round the cape near which they found shelter, into a bay which opened to the north and west. Along the shore of this bay they toiled for several days and reached its head. It seemed impossible to go farther, for the ice was already thick and the winter at hand. A majority of the officers, in view of these facts, advised a return south. But Dr. Kane thought they might winter where they were, or further north if the vessel could be pushed through the ice, and their explorations be made with dog-sledges. To learn more fully the practicability of his view he planned a boat excursion. While this was in contemplation an incident came near ending all further progress of the expedition. The brig grounded in the night, and was left suddenly by the receding tide on her beam ends. The stove in the cabin, which was full of burning coal, upset and put the cabin in a blaze. It was choked by a pilot-cloth overcoat until water could be brought. No other harm was done than the loss of the coat and a big scare. About the first of September the doctor and seven volunteers started in the boat "Forlorn Hope" to see the more northern shore-line. The boat was abandoned at the end of twenty-four hours, all the water having turned to ice, and the party tramped many a weary mile, carrying their food and a few other necessary things. Dr. Kane attained an elevation of eleven hundred feet, from which, with his telescope, he looked north beyond the eightieth degree of latitude, and through a wide extent of country east and west. From this observation he decided that sledging with dogs into and beyond this region was practicable. This had seemed doubtful before. He therefore returned with the decision to put the "Advance" into winter-quarters immediately. A few facts interesting to the scientific were learned on this excursion. A skeleton of a musk ox was found, showing they had been, at no distant time, visitors to this coast. Additions were made to their flowering plants, and up to this date twenty-two varieties had been found. The brig was now drawn in between two islands, and the mooring lines carried out. The explorers were in a sheltered, and, as to the ice, safe winter home. They called it Rensselaer Harbor. Near them an iceberg had anchored as if to watch their movements. A fresh-water pond on the upland promised them its precious treasure if they would _cut_ for it. An island a few rods distant they named Butler Island, and on this they built a store-house. A canal was cut from the brig to this island, and kept open by renewed cutting every morning. They then run the boat through this canal, thus transferring the stores from the hold to the store-house.