56 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
Channel; alight mist hung over portions of it, but not sufficiently 
dense to hide the floes and hummocks from our view. We found 
no trace of life on the uplands, but nearer the ship crossed a 
Hare’s track, and also observed some small circular holes in the 
suow about the size of a penny-piece, at the edges of which the 
snow from inside had been thrown up in small particles; no 
foot-prints were to be seen on the surface, but the Lemmings 
were thus early on the move beneath the snow, no doubt peering 
out of their siphuncles, to see how the sun was getting along. 
Thus we see that with the first glimmer of dawn these little 
animals are awake, even supposing that they hybernate, but if 
they do, it cannot be ascribed to cold, for to-day the thermometer 
registered — 54° or eighty-six degrees below the freezing-point. 
We ran home very briskly, reaching the ship before 4 P.M.; our 
under-clothing was soaking with perspiration, but Egerton’s nose 
and my left cheek were slightly frost-bitten. 
February 11th.—Came across the tracks of a Hare which had 
been feeding on the buds of Saxi/raga oppositifolia. his plant 
I often find in spots bared of snow by the wind, and consequently 
exposed to the low temperature of fifty and sixty degrees below 
zero; yet at the extremity of each stalk, inside of the russet-brown 
hair-fringed leaves, a green bud is to be found, which even the 
intensity of cold prevailing here fails to wither. Without this 
plant the Hares and Lemmings could not exist. 
14th.— Whilst out walking put up a Hare, which escaped. 
The temperature being ~ 50°, I had my gun slung on my 
shoulder, as even through thick gloves the heat of the hands is 
quickly abstracted by contact with metal. This animal had been 
occupying a burrow in a snow-bank. 
16th.—The view from Lookout Hill was very pleasing; towards 
the south there was a warm glow of salmon-colour at mid-day, 
Around the cairn were many tracks of an Ermine. I exposed my 
bare hands for two or three minutes, whilst grubbing up plants, and 
in that time they became so stiff from cold that I could not close 
my fingers: the temperature was ninety degrees below freezing. 
20th.—The armourer shot a Hare, and Mr. Goode, the boat- 
swain brought me in a Lemming in its winter-suit of white.” 
By the end of February, Lemmings were often observed by us 
running on the surface of the snow. When disturbed they buried 
