320 ARCTIC VOYAGES. Chap. IX- 



enough not to admit of her keeping steadily her 

 place for making accurate observations ; in the 

 next, by her moving about, her commander would 

 very speedily find out that, as every meridian must 

 lie in the direction of south, he had lost that on 

 which he had approached the Pole; and conse- 

 quently would be at a loss to shape his course 

 homewards. The settling of this point will na- 

 turally suggest itself as first among the many 

 novel phenomena which will arrest his attention ; 

 and the following observations will probably occur 



to him. 



In the first place, it will be obvious that the time 

 of day— or rather, of the twenty-four hours — would 

 no longer be marked by any apparent change in 

 the altitude of the sun above the horizon ; because, 

 to an observer at the Pole, no such change would 

 take place, except to the small amount of the daily 

 change of declination. Thus, not only to the eye, 

 but also for the practical purpose of obtaining the 

 time by astronomical observation, the sun would 

 appear throughout the twenty-four hours neither 

 to rise nor fall, but to describe a circle round the 

 heavens parallel to the horizon. It follows that 

 this mode of obtaining the time would utterly fail ; 

 and, indeed, however startling the fact may seem, 

 it may nevertheless be asserted with truth, that 

 there would no longer be any such thing, strictly 

 speaking, as apparent time at all. This will appear 



