THE WINTER NIGHT 391 



always in due proportion to our labors. To-day's 

 dinner: Knorr's bean soup, toad-in-the-hole, potatoes, 

 rice and milk, with cranberry jam. Yesterday's dinner : 

 Fish ati gratin (hashed fish) with potatoes, curried rabbit 

 with potatoes and French beans, stewed bilberries, and 

 cranberries with milk. At breakfast yesterday we had 

 freshly baked wheat- bread, at breakfast to-day freshly 

 baked rye-bread. These are specimens of our ordinary 

 bills of fare. It is as I expected : I hear the wind roar- 

 ing in the rigging now ; it is going to be a regular storm, 

 according to our ideas of one here. 



"Saturday, February loth. Though that wind the 

 other day did not come to much after all, we still hoped 

 that we had made good way north, and it was con- 

 sequently an unwelcome surprise when yesterday's ob- 

 servation showed our latitude to be 79° 57' N., 13' 

 farther south instead of farther north. It is extraordi- 

 nary how little inured one gets to disappointments ; the 

 longing begins again ; and again attainment seems so 

 far off, so doubtful. And this though I dream at nights 

 just now of getting out of the ice west of Iceland. Hope 

 is a rickety craft to trust one's self to. I had a long, 

 successful drive with the dogs to-day. 



"Sunday, February iith. To-day we drove out with 

 two teams of dogs. Things went well ; the sledges got 

 on much better over this ice than I thought they would. 

 They do not sink much in the snow. On flat ice four 

 dogs can draw two men. 



