POLAR BEAR AT HERALD ISLAND 115 



The captain and mate had taken observations with 

 an artificial horizon of molasses in a saucer and reckoned 

 out our position within a few miles of its exact one as 

 shown by the fog reveaUng the island clearly six miles 

 away. A beautiful golden sunset promised more fog for 

 the morrow and the southeast wind seemed to confirm 

 this probability. 



"We'll he moored to this floe till the wind shifts," 

 announced the captain. "If it comes out of the north- 

 west we'll have to move or be bottled up." 



Promptly at midnight the air current switched to 

 that quarter and we cast loose. At first we laid a direct 

 course for Wrangell Island and ran into a blind pocket. 

 Another and another lead gave the same result. Then 

 the fog shut us in totally and we lay moored from noon 

 to 3.30 p. M. waiting impatiently for the sky to 

 clear. All this while cake after cake of ice, up to an 

 acre in area, drifted in to nestle near us, gradually fill- 

 ing the bight in which we lay. About the time we were 

 crowded out anyway the curtain drew up enough for us 

 to see about two miles. From the masthead nothing was 

 visible but broken fields of ice. Leads appeared to open 

 in various directions, but we tried them for two hours in 

 a general southerly course, hoping to break through the 

 barrier and get directly out. But all in vain. It was 

 evident that the ice lay packed against Herald Island 

 and considerably east of it, except for the passage north 

 of the barrier, through which we had penetrated to six 

 miles from the lonely spot of land. Captain Larsson 

 threw up his arms and said, "I give it up." 



There was nothing left to do but try to back-track to 

 go out as we had come in. The question was, would we 

 be able to make it, or would the ice have been driven in 



