150 THE GERMAN ARCTIC EXPEDITION. 



southward, we rested in our boats until five p.m. The 

 sun's warm rays did us good, but they also produced 

 that painful evil, snow-blindness. Besides which, from 

 the constant looking-out against the wind for the chance 

 of seeing the entrance to a channel, the eyes were so 

 affected that they could not bear the blinding white of 

 the light upon the glistening ice-fields. First a great 

 weariness is felt, and then a burning in the eye, which 

 soon mounts to unbearable pain. The eye waters vio- 

 lently, and the head is affected. There is then little else 

 to do but to wait patiently, and fasten a cloth over the 

 eyes to keep out every ray of light. After one and a 

 half to two da^^s the suffering is over, but one must be 

 careful of a relapse. This sickness shows itself in many 

 different forms. Some people suffer often and most vio- 

 lently from it, others only find their eyes slightly affected. 

 Later, we tried to guard ourselves by making the green 

 shading-glasses of the telescope into snow-spectacles. 

 By this sensible improvised help, and others which we 

 found, we were able to provide each with this, for an 

 Arctic voyage, most necessary article. Our sailing journey, 

 whi^h at first was through dense ice, had brought us by 

 the evening one and a half nautical miles nearer, when 

 suddenly there fell a calm, and the floes before us had 

 packed themselves into an impenetrable mass. The above- 

 described work of hauling up the boats exhausted our 

 strength again considerably; and after enjoying some 

 coffee and bread, we fell into a deep sleep, dead tired. 

 Bad weather, fall of snow and storm, kept us fixed six 

 days more to the floe. The temperature changed from 

 36r Fahr. by day, to 21° Fahr. by night. 



Yesterday, the 10th of May, in the afternoon, we 



