THE COLD. 
305 
The ship's thermometer outside was at —46°. Inside, 
among- audience and actors, by aid of hmgs, lamps, 
and housings, we got as high as 30° below zero, only 
sixty-two below the freezing point! ! probably the low- 
est atmospheric record of a theatrical representation. 
" It was a strange thing altogether. The conden- 
sation was so excessive that we could barely see the 
performers : they walked in a cloud of vapor. Any 
extra vehemence of delivery was accompanied by vol- 
umes of smoke. The hands steamed. When an excit- 
ed Thespian took olf his hat, it smoked like a dish of 
potatoes. When he stood expectant, musing a reply, 
the vapor wreathed in little curls from his neck. This 
was thirty degrees lower than the lowest of Parry's 
North Georgian performances. 
February 23, Sunday. Mist comes back to us. 
After our past week of glorious sunshine, this return 
to murkiness is far from pleasing. But it might be 
worse : one month ago, and a day like this would have 
made our winter- stricken hearts bound with gladness. 
"Caught a cold last night in attending the theatre. 
A cold here means a sudden malaise, with insufferable 
aches in back and joints, hot eyes, and fevered skin. 
We all have them, coming and going, short-lived and 
long-lived : they leave their mark too. This Arctic 
work brings extra years upon a man. A fresh wind 
makes the cold very unbearable. In walking to-day, 
my beard and mustache became one solid mass of ice. 
I inadvertently put out my tongue, and it instantly 
froze fast to my lip. This being nothing new, costing 
only a smart pull and a bleeding abrasion afterward,, 
I put up my mittened hands to ' blow hot' and thaw 
the unruly member from its imprisonment. Instead 
of succeeding, my mitten was itself a mass of ice in a 
TT 
