286 
LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES. 
direction round the whole circuit of the horizon, except 
along its southern segment,—a blaze of iceblink illu¬ 
minated the sky. A more discouraging spectacle could 
not have met our eyes. The iceblink is a luminous 
appearance, reflected on the heavens from the fields 
of ice that still lie sunk beneath the horizon; it was 
therefore on this occasion an unmistakeable indication 
of the encumbered state of the sea in front of us. 
I had turned in for a few hours of rest, and release 
from the monotonous sense of disappointment, and was 
already lost in a dream of deep bewildering bays of ice, 
and gulfs whose shifting shores offered to the eye every 
possible combination of uncomfortable scenery, without 
possible issue,—when “a voice in my dreaming ear” 
shouted “ Land! ” and I awoke to its reality. I need 
not tell you in what double quick time I tumbled up 
the companion,—or with what greediness I feasted my 
eyes on that longed-for view,—the only sight—as I 
then thought—we were ever destined to enjoy of the 
mountains of Spitzbergen! 
The whole heaven was overcast with a dark 
mantle of tempestuous clouds, that stretched down in 
umbrella-like points towards the horizon, leaving a clear 
