The Sun.
London, England, 1824-08-06 00:00:00

DISCOVERY SHIPS.

•.i
We have been favoured with the followng
copy of a Private Letter respecting the Ex-
pedition in which this Country is so highly in-
terested:—

H. M. Ship Jiecla, Davis's Strait, lat. 69° N.
long. 54. W. June 25.
Our passnge across the Atlantic was exceed-
ingly favourable, being only a fortnight from the Orkneys to
('ape Farewell ; and we have been enveloped in fog ever since,
which has prevented our getting into the Whale-tish Islands,
whither Captain PARRY proposes to unload the transport;
and this evening the weather has become more clear, and we
see the Islands about ten miles to windward of us, so that we
may hope to be there to-morrow morning.
Whale-fish Islands, June 29.

We arrived here, as I had anticipated, on Saturday morning,
and have been since busily engaged in removing our stores
front the transport, which will in all probability leave us on
Thursday morning, and as I am going on an excursion to
Disco, about twenty miles from this, I must finish my letters
to night. There is resident on this island a Danish Governor
or merchant, and about eighty or ninety Eskimaux, or rather
a mixed race of Danes and Eskimaux ; they are mostly
Christians, and it was quite delightful to find the Holy
Scriptures among them, and to see almost every one of
these poor creatures enabled to read the blessed word in their
own language. The huts of these people arc, compara-
tively, clean and comfortable ; they possess a great many of the
European comforts of life ; and among the things that excited
our astonishment, was, their having, in almost every 11114 a
musical instrument, called a Mindolin, very much like a
Guitar, on which all the Eskimaux women play very tolerably.
The Governor's wife is from Copenhagen, and, judging by
her appearance, the climate agrees well with her, for her fat
ruddy cheeks bespeak robust health. With any other man
for a husband, she would seem a monstrous large wo-
man ; but as the Governor happens to be six feet
four, and stout in proportion, they are tolerably well
paired. They have a Missionary residing about eighteen
miles from this, who, during the summer months, is
continually going about visiting the different islands to
admonish and instruct, and to perform the Christian cere-
monies of baptism and marriage, &c. &c. What devotion to
the cause of religion is here exercised ? The privations and
difficulties they must have had to encounter are incalculable ;
and it is quite delightful to ace in this little place, that the
blessed fruit of their labours is making its appearance among
them. I have had two or three most pleasing proofs of the
mproved state of their moral character. Some years ago, I

had a Labrador translation of the Gospels given to me, and I

had now the satisfaction of treceiving the sincere thanks of a
poor fellow for it, to whomt hope it will prove a blessing ; he
could read it very well, and told MC that his daughter, a girl
eleven years of age, would also be able to read it. The trans-
lations which they possess here, were made by the celebrated
Otto Fabricius, and they have also the Church Catechism, and
a Book of Hymns, in their own language. We are to have the
Governor and his wife, and a little girl, not their daughter, but
a child they adopted and brought front Denmark, about eleven
years of age, to .dine with ut to-day ; the latter is, I think, the
most interesting personage on the islands, being a very pretty
little girl, of good manners, anti able to play very sweetly on
the mandolin, and accompany it with a soft and pleasing voice;
it is scarcely possible to look at her and her situation, and not
regret that she is to grow bigger, and to become older—poor
little thing, she will be much delighted to-day, as we shall have
an abundant supply of beads, &c., to give her. The settlement
to which Captains Parry and lioppncr, &c. arc going to-morrow,
is the principal one that the Dunes have in this country, and we
understand that that, are scvsral gentlemanly, intelligent men
O
there ; among them arc two Danish Naval ftieera who are
employed in a survey of all the coasts in possession of their
country, in this neighbourhood, and one of these is son to the
first Minister in Copenhagen.