526 THE VOYAGE OF THE JEANXETTE. 



from the ice all around me like the singing which a 

 whiplash makes in cutting through the air, or a noise 

 produced by switching a rattan. 



March 12th, Saturday. — Latitude 74° 54' N., longi- 

 tude 171° 16' E., 320 miles northwest of Herald Island, 

 — a drift since the 5th of ten and one half miles N. 

 80° E. The temperature remains uniformly low and 

 minus 43°. Sunrise, 6 h. 18 m. ; sunset, 5 h. 25 m. ; 

 early dawn, three a. m. — northeast ; last twilight, nine 

 p. M. — northwest. Considerable fog along horizon from 

 nine a. m. to six p. m. The ice five hundred yards south- 

 east of the ship got under way between six and eight 

 A. m. and made quite a disturbance, and between noon 

 and one p. m. the screaming and grinding commenced 

 ahead. This motion of the ice, after our long quiet of 

 over a year, is incomprehensible, unless by some happy 

 chance we are as close to the northern edge now as we 

 were to the southern edge then of a great icy barrier. 



March 13th, Sunday. — Sunday comes in the ordinary 

 course of events, and finds us still here or hereabouts. 

 Inspection is made as a matter of routine, for things do 

 not change much from clay to clay. The holds and 

 store-rooms are showing large holes, and our provisions 

 are steadily diminishing, with nothing to show for the 

 consumption. We have been an expensive Arctic ex- 

 pedition in view of the results, for, like unworkecl horses, 

 we have " eaten our heads off and have accomplished 

 nothing." 



Divine service followed at 1.30. As an evidence of 

 our vagaries in the Arctic we have taken to flying kites, 

 Chipp of a scientific kind for electrical effects, and the 

 Chinamen of a fancy kind for their own amusement, 

 and in their enjoyment of the fun they amuse the whole 

 ship's company. 



