410 THE VOYAGE OF THE JEANNETTE. 



the record of daily life in the Arctic regions should be 

 vivid, exciting, and full of hair-breadth escapes, or en- 

 joyable and profitable because of the acquisition of valu- 

 able information. If the popular idea is the correct one, 

 how dull and weary and unprofitable will the record of 

 our cruise have been ! I confess to so much disappoint- 

 ment and mortification that I am ashamed each day to 

 make an entry in this book, and willingly defer it to the 

 last moments before going to bed. What can I say that 

 has not already been said over and over again ? Here 

 we are, held fast in the ice, drifting south instead of 

 north, powerless to change our movement an inch, hop- 

 ing to-day that to-morrow will bring a change ; realizing 

 to-morrow, when it becomes " to-day," that it is the 

 same as yesterday was; seeing a summer (?) slip by 

 without doing anything to retrieve our reputation or 

 make us worthy of being numbered in the list of Arctic 

 expeditions ; full of health and energy, with zeal to 

 dare anything, and yet like captives behind bars : add 

 all these together, as making up the sum of one's sen- 

 sations and experiences, and it will be seen that the 

 surroundings are hardly favorable to glowing narrative 

 or absorbing tale. 



So thoroughly do we feel that we are accomplishing 

 nothing, that some of us think that the food we eat and 

 the coal burned to cook it are utter and absolute waste. 

 Of what avail are health and energy if we can make no 

 use of them ? In the world we are not judged by what 

 we can do, but by what we actually perform. In the 

 case of an Arctic expedition, judgment is passed on re- 

 sults and not on the zeal or intention. A ship having 

 the North Pole for an objective point must get to the 

 Pole, otherwise her best efforts are a failure. No mat- 

 ter what the difficulties, or troubles, or accidents, the 



