PROGRESS OF SEASON. 
259 
“ June 5, Monday.—The last party are off: they left 
yesterday at 2 p. jr. I can do nothing more but await 
the ice-changes that are to determine for us our libera¬ 
tion or continued imprisonment. 
“The sun is shining bravely, and the temperature 
feels like a home summer. 
“A Sanderling, the second migratory land-bird we 
have seen, came to our brig to-day, — and is now a 
specimen. 
“June 6, Tuesday.—We are a parcel of sick men, 
affecting to keep ship till our comrades get back. 
Except Mr. Ohlsen and George Whipple, there is not a 
sound man among us. Thus wearily in our Castle of 
Indolence, for Gabor dire it was, and weary woe,’ we 
have been watching the changing days, and noting 
bird and insect and vegetable, as it tells us of the 
coming summer. One fly buzzed around William God¬ 
frey’s head to-day,—he could not tell what the species 
was; and Mr. Petersen brought in a cocoon from which 
the grub had eaten its way to liberty. Ilans gives 
us a seal almost daily, and for a passing luxury we 
have ptarmigan and hare. The little snow-birds have 
crowded to Butler Island, and their songs penetrate 
the cracks of our rude housing. Another snipe too 
was mercilessly shot the very day of his arrival. 
“ The andromeda shows green under its rusty winter- 
dried stems; the willows are sappy and puffing, their 
catskins of last year dropping off. Draba, lichens, 
and stellaria, can be detected by an eye accustomed to 
this dormant vegetation, and the stonecrops are really 
