chaos.

"Never before has one seen or heard anything comparable to that which
one sees and hears there; one has conceived of nothing like it, even in
one's dreams! It belongs at once to the fantastic and to the real: it
disconcerts the memory, dazes the mind, and fills it with an
indescribable sense of awe and admiration.

"But if the spectacle of the bay had something magical in it, ominous
and gloomy was the scene on shore. In all directions the ground was
white with the bones of seals and walruses, left there by the Norwegian
or Russian fishermen, who formerly visited these high latitudes for the
purpose of collecting oil; for some years, however, they have abandoned
a pursuit which was much more dangerous than profitable. These great
bones, bleached by time and preserved intact by the frost, seemed so
many skeletons of giants--the past dwellers in a city which had finally
been swallowed up by the sea.

"The long fleshless fingers of the seals, so like to those of the human
hand, rendered the illusion singularly striking and filled one with a
kind of terror. I quitted the charnel-house, and directing my steps very
cautiously over the slippery soil, penetrated inland. I found myself
very speedily in the middle of a cemetery; but this time, the remains
lying on the frozen snow were human. Several coffins, half open and
empty, had formerly been occupied by human bodies, which the teeth of
the white bear had recently profaned. As, owing to the thickness of the
ice, it is impossible to dig graves, a number of enormous stones had, in
primitive fashion, been heaped over the coffin-lids, so as to form a
defence against the attacks of wild beasts; but the stout limbs of "the
great man in the pelisse" (as the Norwegian fishers picturesquely call
the polar bear) had removed the stones and devastated the tombs; a
throng of bones strewed the shore, half broken and gnawed ... the
pitiful remains of the bears' banquet. I carefully collected them, and
replaced them piously in their proper receptacles.

"In the middle of this work of burial, I was seized with an
indescribable horror; the thought came upon me that I was doomed,
perhaps, to lay my bones among these dismembered skeletons. I had been
forewarned of the perils of our expedition. I had accepted the warning
and fancied that I comprehended all the hazard; yet these tombs made me
for the moment shudder, and for the first time I dwelt with regret on
the memories of France,