On the 8th of June Lieutenant Parr appeared on the quarter-deck of the _Alert_ greeting in silence the one or two who chanced to meet him. That some calamity had happened was evident from his looks. He had walked on alone for forty miles to bring the news that Markham's party were in sore distress. Measures of rescue were instantly taken; Lieutenant May and Doctor Moss, on snow-shoes, pushing ahead with the dog-sledge laden with medical stores, while Nares with a strong party followed. On their arrival one man had died, and of the others no less than eleven were brought back to the ship on the relief sledges. Ten days afterwards, fearing a similar fate had overtaken Aldrich's party, Lieutenant May was despatched to find him. As with Markham, scurvy had begun on the outward journey, and it had become so bad on the return that one of the men was being sent off to the ship when May arrived with help. It had nevertheless been a successful journey, the road being easier than that by the northern route. Aldrich had traced the continuous border of the heavy pack for two hundred miles from Floeberg Beach, rounded Cape Columbia, in 83° 7´ N., the northernmost point of Grant Land, and, along the coast trending steadily south-west, had reached longitude 85° 33´ and sighted Cape Alfred Ernest in longitude 86½°. With his arrival there were over forty scurvy patients on board the _Alert_; and Nares was to learn that the sledge parties from the _Discovery_ had been similarly affected. Lieutenant Beaumont had gone along the North Greenland coast, reaching, on the 21st of May, 51° W., in 82° 20´ N., and sighting Cape May, Mount Hooker, and Cape Britannia. On the 10th of May, while on his outward journey, he had sent back Lieutenant Rawson to bring a relief party to meet him, and Rawson with Hans and eight dogs, accompanied by Doctor Coppinger, reached him on the 25th of June when he was on his last possible day's journey, he and two of his men dragging the sledge with four helpless comrades lashed on the top of it.