356 THE GEEMAN ARCTIC EXPEDITION. 



at no great distance exclaim in a voice of alarm, 

 " A bear ! a bear ! " We limTied forward, and found 

 our companion behind a group of high ice-cliffs, in 

 such a state of excitement as a hand-to-hand encounter 

 with a bear might well warrant. He informed us that 

 he was surprised by it at about fifty paces' distance, 

 that it had broken from a barrier of hummocks and had 

 galloped up to within five paces, had then raised itself, 

 and had struck him down with both fore-paws. Cope- 

 land had had no time to load his gun ; but as the 

 creature caught his clothes, he swung the butt-end of it 

 across its snout. This (and perhaps the noise of our 

 approach) had the unexpected effect of putting Master 

 Bruin to flight ; and we saw the monster a hundred 

 paces off in the swinging gallop peculiar to him, looking 

 round every now and then. 



This experience served as a lesson to us to keep our 

 weapons loaded on the sledge for the future, and to be 

 watchful, especially with a circumscribed horizon of view. 



In spite of all our efforts to keep to our southerly 

 course, the constantly increasing collection of the ice 

 masses forced us to the eastward ; and at eight a.m., in 

 the latitude of Cape Borlase Warren, we stopped at the 

 entrance of Gael Hamkes Bay. We found ourselves 

 nearly five miles from the coast in a perfect forest of high- 

 jagged ice-cliffs, the boundary of which we could not see 

 even from a high stand -point. Hound about us rose ice- 

 barriers on every side; evidently the pack-ice of the 

 previous summer had drifted direct into the bay, and had 

 there increased to bergs. They were the same masses 

 which a month before had prevented the ship from 

 advancing. 



