224 
DRIFTING SOUTH. 
“ To the south every thing is in drifting motion — 
water, sludge, frost-smoke — but no seals 
“ We caught a poor little fox to-day in a dead-fall. 
We ate him as an anti-scorhutic. 
“ October 6, Sunday. A dismal day ; the wind howl- 
ing, and the snow, fine as flour, drifting into every 
chink and cranny. The cold quite a nuisance, al- 
though the mercury is up again to +6°. It is blowing 
a gale. What if the floe, in which we are providen- 
tially glued, should take it into its head to break off, 
and carry us on a cruise before the wind ! 
“ 8 P.M. Took a pole, and started off to make a voy- 
age of discovery around our floe. After some weary 
walking over hummocks, and some uncomfortable sous- 
ings in the snow-dust, found that our cape has dwin- 
dled to an isthmus. In the midst of snow and haze, 
of course, I did not venture across to the other ice. 
“ We look now anxiously at the gale — ^turning in, 
clothes on, so as to he ready for changes. 
“12 Midnight. They report us adrift. Wind, a 
gale from the northward and w'estward. An odd cruise 
this ! The American expedition fast in a lump of ice 
about as big as Washington Square, and driving, like 
the shanty on a raft, before a howling gale. 
“ October 7, Monday. Going on deck this morning, 
a new coast met my eyes. Our little matrix of ice 
had floated at least twenty miles to the south from 
yesterday’s anchorage. The gale continues ; but the 
day is beautifully clear, and we have neared the west- 
ern coast enough to recognize the features of the lime- 
stone cliffs, although many a wrinkle of them is now 
pearl-powdered with snow-drift. 
“ Prominent among these was Advance Bluff ; and 
to the south of it, a great indentation in the limestone 
