The northern shore of the Back River is bounded by high hills, almost a mountain range, and inland could be seen rocky hills piled together, barren and forbidding. About noon on the 14th, the party came upon some freshly cut blocks of snow turned up on end,—a sure sign of natives in the vicinity,—and farther on footprints in the snow as well as a cache of musk-ox meat. Following the tracks after breaking camp the next day, the party soon reached several igloos, and communication was immediately established with the inhabitants. The chief spokesman was an Okjoolik, who with his family comprised all that was left of the tribe which formerly occupied the western coast of Adelaide Peninsula and King William Land. From this interesting and important witness much information about the Franklin party was gained. When quite a little boy he had seen some white men alive, and from the description it might have been Lieutenant Back and his party. Years later, he saw a white man dead in the bunk of a big ship, which was frozen in near an island about five miles west of Grant Point on Adelaide Peninsula. He and his son had seen the tracks of white men on the mainland. The natives had boarded the ship at intervals, and, not knowing how to use the doors, had cut a hole in the side on a level with the ice and entered for the purpose of stealing wood and iron. In the following spring, the ship had filled with water and sunk. There were evidences that people had lived aboard the ship, as some cans of fresh meat mixed with tallow were found. There were knives, forks, spoons, pans, cups, and plates aboard, and afterwards a few articles were found on shore after the vessel had gone down. Another native described seeing two boats on the Back River containing white men, and he also saw a stone monument on Montreal Island containing a pocket knife, a pair of scissors, and some fish hooks, but no papers of any description. After an encampment of two days and a half, Lieutenant Schwatka continued his journey accompanied by some of these natives as guides.