424 FARTHES2' NORTH 



servation showed 80^ 4' north latitude. But why so dis- 

 pirited ? I am staring myself blind at one single point — 

 am thinking solely of reaching the Pole and forcing our 

 way through to the Atlantic Ocean. And all the time 

 our real task is to explore the unknown polar regions. 

 Are we doinu; nothino; in the service of science } It will 

 be a goodly collection of observations that we shall take 

 home with us from this region, with which we are now 

 rather too well acquainted. The rest is, and remains, a 

 mere matter of vanity. ' Love truth more, and victory 

 less.' 



" I look at Eilif Peterssen's picture, a Norwegian pine 

 forest, and I am there in spirit. How marvellously 

 lovely it is there now% in the spring, in the dim, melan- 

 choly stillness that reigns among the stately stems ! I 

 can feel the damp moss in w^iich my foot sinks softly and 

 noiselessly ; the brook, released from the winter bondage, 

 is murmuring through the clefts and among the rocks, 

 with its brownish-yellow water ; the air is full of the scent 

 of moss and pine-needles; while overhead, against the 

 light-blue sky, the dark pine-tops rock to and fro in the 

 spring breeze, ever uttering their murmuring wail, and 

 beneath their shelter the soul fearlessly expands its wings 

 and cools itself in the forest dew^ 



" O solemn pine forest, the only confidant of my child- 

 hood, it was from you I learned nature's deepest tones — 

 its wildness, its melancholy! You colored my soul for life. 



"Alone — far in the forest — beside the glowing embers 



