NOTES FROM AN ARCTIC JOURNAL. 53 
ice + 11° F., at four inches + 8° F., and at eight inches + 3° F. 
. The water in the fire-hole at a depth of eight feet was + 282° F. 
(the normal winter temperature). At 6 P.m., two thermometers 
taken simultaneously at the maintop, and four feet above the floe, 
gave + 24°F’. for the higher, and + 21°F. for the lower level. 
6th.—When out walking I heard a peculiar cry sounding from 
the hills; it might have been from one of our dogs chasing a 
Hare, but it differed from any note I have yet heard from them. 
It was a weird melancholy cry, and in all probability was that of 
a Wolf. 
11th.—The moon very bright; at noon the heavens were 
unobscured by a single cloud. I could read a book (Darwin’s 
‘Voyage of a Naturalist’) with ease whilst walking on the floe. 
Cape Joseph Henry, distant twenty-five miles, was distinctly 
discernible. Aldrich, when travelling on the 25th September 
last, cut loose a bitch from his team which was constantly 
having fits, at a distance of some thirty miles from the ship. 
When Captain Markham was returning along the same route 
during the second week in October, this animal hung about his 
party, and though never approaching in the daytime, came to 
their tents at night, and picked up the scraps that were left out 
for her. She was observed on the 13th October, the night prior 
to Markham’s sledge-parties arriving at the ship. To-night she 
came back and allowed Petersen to catch her. She was a mere 
skeleton. She did not seem shy with men, but would not 
consort with the other dogs. It seems probable that this animal, 
for the last two months, must have been stealthily visiting the 
neighbourhood of the ship at nights, and picking up offal; it is 
impossible that the products of the chase could have kept it alive. 
This appears to be an instance of the Eskimo-dog reverting to its 
wolfish origin. 
22nd.—The moon disappeared below our horizon on the 19th, 
not to reappear till next year. It is a very joyous thought that 
the sun is on its way back to us. Captain Nares discovered the 
track of a small animal to-day on the floe, which can be nothing 
else but an Ermine. The temperature is — 40° F. ~ 
25th.—Very dark to-day at noon, I could not make out the 
letters on the title-page of ‘Darwin’s Voyage;’ I could distinguish 
black and white, namely, a difierence of colour between the print 
and the paper, but nothing more. 
