tions to
maintain, their strength. Fuel, too, offered a serious problem. Alcohol,
stearine, and broken wood from a whaleboat and barrels, were all employed.
In order to get the greatest heat from the wood it was broken up into
pieces not much larger than matches.

And yet packed into that noisome hovel, ill-fed and ill-clothed, with the
Arctic wind roaring outside, the temperature within barely above freezing,
and a wretched death staring each man in the face, these men were not
without cheerfulness. Lying almost continually in their sleeping bags,
they listened to one of their number reading aloud; such books as
"Pickwick Papers," "A History of Our Own Times," and "Two on a Tower."
Greely gave daily a lecture on geography of an hour or more; each man
related, as best he could, the striking facts about his own State and city
and, indeed, every device that ingenuity could suggest, was employed to
divert their minds and wile away the lagging hours. Birthdays were
celebrated by a little extra food--though toward the end a half a gill of
rum for the celebrant, constituted the whole recognition of the day. The
story of Christmas Day is inexpressibly touching as told in the simple
language of Greely's diary:

"Our breakfast was a thin pea-soup, with seal blubber, and a small
quantity of preserved potatoes. Later two cans of cloudberries were served
to each mess, and at half-past one o'clock Long and Frederick commenced
cooking dinner, which consisted of a seal stew, containing seal blubber,
preserved potatoes and bread, flavored with pickled onions; then came a
kind of rice pudding, with raisins, seal blubber, and condensed milk.
Afterward we had chocolate, followed later by a kind of punch made of a
gill of rum and a quarter of a lemon to each man.... Everybody was
required to sing a song or tell a story, and pleasant conversation with
the expression of kindly feelings, was kept up until midnight."

[Illustration: AN ARCTIC HOUSE]

But that comparative plenty and good cheer did not last long. In a few
weeks the unhappy men, or such as still clung to life, were living on a
few shrimps, pieces of sealskin boots, lichens, and even more offensive
food. The shortening of the ration, and the resulting hunger, broke down
the moral sense of some, and by one device or another, food was stolen.
Only two or three were guilty of this crime--an execrable one in such an
emergency--and one of these, Private Henry, was shot by order of