LOOKING FOR THE SUN. 249 



tagion, and crawled up from among his saucepans and 

 coppers, and, shading his eyes with his stove-hardened 

 hands, peered out into the growing twilight. " I tinks 

 dis be very long night," said he, " and I likes once 

 more to see de blessed sun." The steward was in a 

 state of chronic excitement. He could not let the 

 sun rest in peace for an hour. He must watch for 

 him constantly. He must be forever running up on 

 deck and out on the ice, book in hand, trying to read 

 by the returning daylight. He was impatient with 

 the time. " Don't the Commander think the sun will 

 come back sooner than the 18th?" "Don't he think 

 it will come back on the 17th?" "Was he quite sure 

 that it would n't appear on the 16th?" "I'm afraid, 

 steward, we must rely upon the Nautical Almanac." 

 "But might n't the Nautical Almanac be wrong?" 

 — and I could clearly perceive that he thought my 

 ciphering might be wrong too. 



Meanwhile we were tormented with another set of 

 gales, and we could scarcely stir abroad. The ice was 

 all broken up in the outer bay, and the open sea came 

 nearer to us than during any previous period of the 

 winter. The ice was nearly all driven out of the bay, 

 and the broad, dark, bounding water was not only in 

 sight from the deck, but I could almost drop a minie- 

 ball into it from my rifle, while standing on the poop. 

 Even the ice in the inner harbor was loosened around 

 the shore, and, thick and solid though it was, I thought 

 at one time that there was danger of its giving way 

 and going bodily out to sea. 



Strange, too, along the margin of this water there 

 came a flock of speckled birds to shelter themselves 

 under the lee of the shore, and to warm their lit- 

 tle feet in the waters which the winds would not let 



