SCHAROK AGAIN 251 
rain made it most unpleasant. Nothing could be gained 
by going out, for you could only struggle miserably along 
half-blinded. Hyland complained of a bad pain in his 
back. ‘I’m all right when I lie still,’ he said, ‘but 
whenever I move it shoots all up my back.’ 
It did not seem to be rheumatism exactly, but still the 
tent was soaking wet and everything inside it. So I 
made him move up into Uano’s hut, which was, at all 
events, more or less rain-proof, while I did the cooking 
for the day. The white-fronted goose came as a pleasant 
change from long-tailed duck, on which we had chiefly 
lived. 
For the first time I noticed at midnight the sun’s 
lower limb below the horizon. 
‘The ice is all back again, packed right against the 
land.’ 
July 24th.—With a change of wind to-day to the 
south-west and then to north-west, the ice began 
cannonading as usual. 
Found all the biscuits wet, so turned them out to dry. 
‘We have now exactly forty-five of them left, which puts 
us on an allowance of three a day for a week, by the end 
of which time the Savoz or else the Russians may have 
come.’ 
The snow-water had failed us. But we found a hole 
filled by yellow water from the bogs, and down to this 
we moved the tent. 
