THE NEW YEAR, i8g6 47^ 



fat. It was so windy that the gusts were apt to blow 

 you over if you were not prepared for them ; but with 

 the air so mild as it was, wind did not matter much ; it 

 would not have been such bad work to skin it had it not 

 been that it was lying in a hollow and was so big that 

 one man could not stir it. After a time, however, Johan- 

 sen came, and at last we had got it dismembered, and had 

 dragged it down to the ice and piled it on the sledge. 

 We had not gone far, however, before we found that it 

 would be too heavy for us to draw all at once against 

 this wind and for such a distance. We laid half of it in 

 a hea,p on the ice and spread the skin over it, intending 

 to fetch it in a day or two ; and even then we had diffi- 

 culty enough in fighting on against the wind in the dark, 

 so that it was late at night before we got home. But it 

 was long since we had so much enjoyed our home-coming 

 and being able to lie down in our bag and sup off fresh 

 meat and hot soup." 



We lived on that bear for six weeks. 



" When Johansen was out this morning at six, he 

 thought he saw little auks in millions flying up the 

 sound. When we went out at two in the afternoon 

 there was an unceasing passage of flock after flock out to 

 sea, and this continued until late in the afternoon. I saw 

 two guillemots ( C/r/a giyllc), too, fiy over our heads. 

 They are the first we have seen.* 



* We had now, as the spring advanced, a good opportunity of seeing 

 how the little auk in great flocks and the black guillemots in smaller num- 



