nseasonable temperatures; while, so far as
snow and ice are necessary to thorough enjoyment, the supply in the
Arctic regions is on a scale sufficient to satisfy the most ardent
admirer of an old-fashioned Christmas. The frozen-in Investigators
under McClure kept their first Arctic Christmas soberly, cheerfully,
and in good fellowship, round tables groaning with good cheer, in the
shape of Sandwich Island beef, musk veal from the Prince of Wales's
Strait, mince-meat from England, splendid preserves from the Green
Isle, and dainty dishes from Scotland. Every one talked of home, and
speculated respecting the doings of dear ones there; and healths were
drunk, not omitting those of their fellow-labourers sauntering
somewhere in the regions about, but how near or how far away none
could tell. When the festival came round again, the _Investigator_ and
_Enterprise_ were alone in their glory, and they were separated by
miles of frozen sea; but they had solved the great problem.[93] On
board the _Investigator_, frost-bound in the Bay of Mercy, things went
as merry as the proverbial marriage-bell. After divine service,
everybody took a constitutional on the ice until dinner-time; then the
officers sat down to a meal of which the _piece de resistance_ was a
haunch of Banks' Island reindeer, weighing twenty pounds, with fat two
inches thick, and a most delicious flavour; while the crew were
regaling upon venison and other good things, double allowance of grog
included; and dinner discussed, dancing, singing, and skylarking
filled up the holiday hours till bedtime; the fun being kept up with
unflagging humour, and with such propriety withal as to make their
leader wish the anxious folks at home could have witnessed the scene
created amidst so many gloomy influences, by the crew of a ship after
two years' sojourn in those ice-bound regions upon their own
resources. Another Christmas found the brave fellows still confined in
their snowy prison; but their table boasted plum-pudding rich enough
for Arctic appetites, Banks' Land venison, Mercy Bay hare-soup,
ptarmigan pasties, and musk-ox beef--hung-beef, surely, seeing it had
been dangling in the rigging above two years. The poets among the men
wrote songs making light of the hardships they had endured; the
painters exhibited pictures of past perils; comic actors were not
wanting; and the whole company, casting all anxiety to the winds,
enjoyed themselves to the utmost."[94]

In the sp