480 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
indies vinegar ; and weekly 1 lb. wlieat-flour, 30 ort butter, 21 ort 
salt, 7 ort mustard, 3 ort pepper, and two cubic inches vinegar. 
Besides what is included in the above list, “ multegrot ” 
(preserved cloudberries), mixed with rum, was served out twice a 
week from 'the 15th February to the 1st April. I would 
willingly have had a larger quantity of this, according to 
northern experience, excellent antidote to scurvy, but as the 
cloudberry harvest completely failed in 1877, I could not, at any 
price, procure for the Expedition the quantity that was required. 
There was purchased in Finland instead, a large quantity of 
cranberry-juice, which was regularly served out to the crew 
and much liked by them. We carried with us besides a pair of 
living swine, which were slaughtered for the Christmas festivities.^ 
All the men at that time had an opportunity of eating fresh 
pork twice a week, an invaluable interruption to the monotonous 
preserved provisions, which in its proportion conduced, during 
this festival, to which we inhabitants of the North are attached 
by so many memories, to enliven and cheer us. 
The produce of hunting was confined during the course 
of the winter to some ptarmigan and hares, and thus did not 
yield any contribution worth mentioning to the provisioning 
of the vessel. On the other hand, I was able by barter with 
the natives to procure fish in considerable abundance, so that at 
certain seasons the quantity was sufficient to allow of fresh 
fish being served out once a week. The kind of fish which was 
principally obtained during the winter, a sort of cod with 
greyish-green vertebrae, could however at first only be served 
in the gun-room, because the crew, on account of the colour of 
its bones, for a long time had an invincible dislike to it. 
1 To carry animals for slaughter on vessels during Polar expeditions 
cannot be sufficiently recommended. Their flesh acts beneficially by 
forming a change from the preserved provisions, which in course of time 
become exceedingly disagreeable, and their care a not less important 
interruption to the monotony of the winter life. 
