204 ROUTINE OF DUTIES. 



The hunters continue to chase the reindeer and 

 foxes in the moonlight, — more, however, from habit 

 and for exercise than from any encouragement they 

 find in success ; for, even when the moon shines, they 

 can shoot only at random. The work at the observa- 

 tory goes on, and when the magnetic " term day " 

 comes round we clamber over the ice-foot every hour, 

 and it marks an event. The occultations of Jupiter's 

 satellites are carefully observed through the telescope, 

 that our chronometers may not go astray ; the tide 

 continues to rise and fall, regardless of the vast load 

 of ice that it lifts, and indifferent as to the fact that it 

 is watched. Dodge keeps up his ice-measurements, 

 and finds that the crystal table has got down to our 

 keel (6 1 feet), so that we are resting in a perfect cra- 

 dle. That the sailors may have something to do, I 

 have given them an hour's task each day sewing up 

 canvas bags for the spring journeys. From the offi- 

 cers I continue to have the same daily reports ; the 

 newspaper comes out regularly, and continues to 

 afford amusement ; the librarian hands out the books 

 every morning, and they are well read ; the officers 

 and the men have no new means of entertainment, 

 and usually fill up the last of the waking hours (I 

 cannot say the evening, where there is nothing else 

 but night) with cards and pipes. I go into the cabin 

 oftener than I used to ; but I do not neglect my chess 

 with Knorr, and, until Sonntag left us, I filled up 

 a portion of every evening in converse with him, and, 

 for the lack of any thing new, we talked over and 

 over again of our summer plans, and calculated to a 

 nicety the measure of our labor, and the share which 

 each would take of the work laid out. 



And thus we jog on toward the spring ; but each 



