The Winter Night. 245 



s with me, and one or two men following. At 



<-> 



some distance we came to the place where it had spent 

 the night poor beast, a ghastly night ! Here I also 

 saw tracks of the mother. One shudders to think of her 

 watching over her poor young one, which must have had 

 its back shot through. Soon we came up to the cripple, 

 dragging itself away from us over the ice as best it could. 

 Seeing no other way of escape, it threw itself into a 

 small water opening and dived time after time. While 

 we were putting a noose on a rope, the clogs rushed 

 round the hole as if they had gone mad, and it was 

 difficult to keep them from jumping into the water after 

 the bear. At last we were ready, and the next time 

 the creature came up it got a noose round one paw and 

 a ball in the head. Whilst the others drew it to the 

 ship, I followed the mother's tracks for some way, but 

 could not find her. I had soon to turn back to see if 

 there was no prospect of moving the Fraui ; but I 

 found that the ice had packed together again a little at 

 the very time when we could generally calculate on its 

 slackening. In the afternoon Hansen and 1 went off 

 once more after the bear. W r e saw, as I expected, that 

 she had come back, and had followed her daughter's 

 funeral procession for some way, but then she had 

 gone off east, and as it grew dark we lost her tracks in 

 some newly packed ice. We have only one matter 

 for regret in connection with this bear episode, and 

 that is the disappearance of two clogs : ' Narrifas ' and 



