174 FROM EDINBURGH TO THE ANTARCTIC 
of soft carpet was quite a new sensation ; we luxuriated in 
cushioned chairs, lingered over bocks, and inhaled German 
cigars with delight. Even the obstructions customary in 
small drawing-rooms, things you trip over and knock 
down, had become a pleasure to us, and if our hosts could 
only know what intense gratification those creature com- 
forts gave to our souls they would feel they had not 
lived in vain. 
We were so blissfully contented at the consul's that we 
almost forgot about Natural History, and only remembered 
the letters we had called for as we were going away. 
None of the pile we overhauled were for us. Most of 
them were addressed in lilac ink and feminine hands to 
the Jason's crew. To Sigurdsons, Boernsons, and other 
high-sounding classic names — doubtless from fond Brun- 
hildas in Gammel Norge. 
We next went to the Company's stores. All the Falk- 
land Island life gravitates there, and we did not attempt 
to resist the attraction, but went and bought all sorts of 
things and paid absurd prices for everything excepting 
for sketch-books, which were half the price they cost 
in London ! I always did think artists' colourmen laid 
it on. 
From the Company's stores to the Company's bar is 
but a step, and the invitation from some of our crew who 
were there was too pressing for either the doctor or 
myself to resist, even if we had tried. We found them 
getting rapidly mellow, making up against time for three 
months' total abstinence. A very small amount of liquor 
seemed to affect them, owing, I suppose, to their meagre 
