UNDER THE MIDNIGHT SUN. 309 



length and fifty feet in width, narrowing to cracks at 

 either end. For several days he and I had observed 

 from aloft a long ridge of ice to the southward, and had 

 made conjectures as to its being stranded on a reef or 

 shoal ; and since he has gone out there and thinks it 

 looks much like it, he will on Monday make one more 

 trip to sound. He says that while he stood on the floe 

 edge looking at this ridge, everything being still, there 

 commenced a trembling of the ice on which he stood, 

 and a commotion in the water in front of him, when 

 suddenly a large mass of ice as big as the after part of 

 this ship cut off at the poop came up with a bound, and 

 settled to its line of flotation. Being in some unac- 

 countable manner liberated from the power that held 

 it under the floe, it made its way naturally to the sur- 

 face. 



The surgeon's report is rendered to-day. Of the 

 eight officers, the condition of two is excellent, five 

 good, and one fair (considering) ; of the twenty- three 

 men, the condition of seventeen is excellent, six good ; 

 and the condition of the two natives is excellent. 



Danenhower's case has no marked improvement. 

 With the confinement he has undergone, and the cer- 

 tain mental anxiety which he no doubt experiences, it 

 is wonderful that scurvy has not selected him as a fair 

 opportunity. As the temperature falls from 6.8° to 

 minus 13.5° we are evidently not done with winter 

 yet. 



The familiar grinding and groaning of ice in motion 

 was heard at one a. m. Somehow or other, I cannot 

 help anticipating a considerable disturbance at our next 

 new moon^ on the 9th inst. Our sudden drift and re- 

 cent high temperature indicate a loosening of the ice 

 somewhere, and if we go toward the place we may be- 

 come mixed with it. 



