THE JOURNEY SOUTHWARD 525 



the ice to fetch salt-water, had made up the fire, cut up 

 the meat and put it in the pot, and had ah-eady taken 

 off one boot, preparatory to creeping into the bag again, 

 when I saw that the mist over the land had risen a little 

 since the preceding- day. I thought it would be as well 

 to take the opportunity of having a look round, so I 

 put on my boot again and went up on to a hummock 

 near to look at the land beyond. A gentle breeze 

 came from the land, bearing with it a confused noise 

 of thousands of bird -voices from the mountain there. 

 As I listened to these sounds of life and movement, 

 watched flocks of auks flying to and fro above my 

 head, and as my eye followed the line of coast, stop- 

 ping at the dark, naked cliffs, glancing at the cold, 

 icy plains and glaciers in a land which I believed to be 

 unseen by any human eye and untrodden by any hu- 

 man foot, reposing in Arctic majesty behind its mantle 

 of mist — a sound suddenly reached my ear so like the 

 barking of a dog that I started. It was only a couple 

 of barks, but it could not be anything else. I strained 

 my ears, but heard no more, only the same bubbling 

 noise of thousands of birds. I must have been mis- 

 taken, after all ; it was only birds I had heard ; and again 

 my eye passed from sound to island in the west. Then 

 the barking came again — first single barks, then full cry; 

 there was one deep bark, and one sharper; there was 

 no longer any room for doubt. At that moment I 

 remembered having heard two reports the day before 



