THE GREAT WHITE JOURNEY 23 1 



entirely different from any with which we are aquainted in 

 better known portions of the globe that I have sometimes 

 found it difificult to convey, even to the most cultivated 

 minds, a really adequate conception of what the great ice-cap 

 is like. 



The terms "inland ice" and "great interior frozen sea," 

 two of the more common names by which the region traversed 

 by us is generally known, both suggest to the majority of 

 people erroneous ideas. In the first place, the surface is not 

 ice, but merely a compacted snow. The term " sea " is also 

 a misnomer in so far as it suggests the idea of a sometime ex- 

 panse of water subsequently frozen over. The only justifica- 

 tion for the term is the unbroken and apparently infinite hori- 

 zon which bounds the vision of the traveler upon its surface. 

 Elevated as the entire region is to a height of from 4000 to 

 9000 feet above the sea-level, the towering mountains of the 

 coast, which would be visible to the sailor at a distance of 

 sixty to eighty miles, disappear beneath the landward con- 

 vexity of the ice-cap by the time the traveler has penetrated 

 fifteen or twenty miles into the interior, and then he may 

 travel for days and weeks with no break whatever in the con- 

 tinuity of the sharp, steel-blue line of the horizon. 



The sea has its days of towering, angry waves, of laughing, 

 glistening white-caps, of mirror-like calm. The " frozen sea " 

 is always the same — motionless, petrified. Around its white 

 shield the sun circles for months in succession, never hiding 

 his face except in storms. Once a month the pale full moon 



