EQUIPPED FOR AN ARCTIC CRUISE 37 



dence Bay, passing by the northern side of St. Lawrence 

 Island, the largest isolated island in Bering Sea. It 

 did not turn out that we were destined to follow this 

 exact route, as indeed happened on almost every occa- 

 sion when we drew a straight line upon the chart; but 

 at the time of starting we were bhssfully ignorant of 

 what the "Abler" could do or could not do, according 

 to the stress of wind and weather. 



Meantime we unpacked our things and stowed them 

 in our cabin, where we could use them at once, or in 

 the hold of the ship, whence we could get them in case 

 they were wanted. There were two staterooms in the 

 after cabin house designed for the use of the four hunters. 

 Elting and I drew the larger of these, with three bunks 

 arranged in a tier, one above the other. Collins and 

 Lovering obtained the smaller, with two berths. 



Our neighbors' room measured six by six feet, of 

 which the bunks left a floor space about four by six feet. 

 There was a door conomunicating with our room, and 

 we invited them to use so much of our apartment as 

 they needed to put away their things. But after they 

 had unpacked and hung up everything that they had 

 on the walls of their cabin, and upon strings ingeniously 

 rigged between all available projections of the walls and 

 ceiling, there was hardly space to get into the room 

 from the deck door, to say nothing of being able to open 

 the communicating door into our cabin. They had a 

 little stool to sit on, but generally crawled into their 

 bunks and lay down, for lack of standing room on the 

 floor. Everything in their stateroom was so behung 

 with articles that their going to bed reminded me of 

 an oriole retiring into its nest. 



As promptly as possible we changed the clothes of 



