THE RETURN TO COLD AND DARKNESS. 467 



of the anxious times of last winter, not knowing how 

 soon we may have pandemonium around us. In order 

 to provide for any emergencies we can do nothing more 

 than getting provisions on deck, convenient for heaving 

 on the ice, and we therefore devote the day to this oc- 

 cupation. Pemmican, bread, tea, sugar, cooking-stoves, 

 alcohol, tents, and sleeping-bags are all that we can 

 hope to be able to drag should we have to leave the 

 ship, adding, of course, our knapsacks, medical stores, 

 instruments, arms and ammunition, and our records, 

 and if we can get over the two hundred and fifty and 

 odd miles between us and Siberia with this load we 

 shall do well. 



October Qth, Wednesday. — Hardly had Kaack re- 

 ceived his discharge from the sick-list than he is back 

 again. To-day, while moving around the spar deck in 

 the deck-house, he slipped and fell, striking on his right 

 elbow and again fracturing the olecranon process. As 

 the recovery this time will be a more tedious operation 

 than before, we cannot count on his being all right 

 again in six weeks. 



Commenced to - day banking up snow against the 

 ship's side. If we are to be located in the pack a sec- 

 ond winter we may as well keep all the heat inside the 

 ship, if possible, instead of radiating it through the side. 

 In order to prevent the freezing of our forward pumps, 

 we have to keep a fire in the stove on the galley plat- 

 form at night, and that adds to the demand on our di- 

 minishing coal pile. 



The difficulties under which we labor, the knowledge 

 that we have done nothing, and the virtual impossibil- 

 ity of doing anything but retreat should the ice open 

 (which it certainly shows no signs of doing), are almost 

 enough to make me tear my hair in impotent rage. 



