rd the sigh of a departing
spirit. Here and there are left a few waving streamers of light,
vague as a foreboding--they are the dust from the aurora's glittering
cloak. But now it is growing again; new lightnings shoot up, and the
endless game begins afresh. And all the time this utter stillness,
impressive as the symphony of infinitude. I have never been able to
grasp the fact that this earth will some day be spent and desolate
and empty. To what end, in that case, all this beauty, with not a
creature to rejoice in it? Now I begin to divine it. This is the
coming earth--here are beauty and death. But to what purpose? Ah,
what is the purpose of all these spheres? Read the answer, if you can,
in the starry blue firmament.

"Wednesday, September 27th. Gray weather and strong wind from the
south-southwest. Nordahl, who is cook to-day, had to haul up some
salt meat which, rolled in a sack, had been steeping for two days
in the sea. As soon as he got hold of it he called out, horrified,
that it was crawling with animals. He let go the sack and jumped
away from it, the animals scattering round in every direction. They
proved to be sandhoppers, or Amphipoda, which had eaten their way
into the meat. There were pints of them, both inside and outside of
the sack. A pleasant discovery; there will be no need to starve when
such food is to be had by hanging a sack in the water.

"Bentzen is the wag of the party; he is always playing some practical
joke. Just now one of the men came rushing up and stood respectfully
waiting for me to speak to him. It was Bentzen that had told him I
wanted him. It won't be long before he has thought of some new trick.

"Thursday, September 28th. Snowfall with wind. To-day the dogs'
hour of release has come. Until now their life on board has been
really a melancholy one. They have been tied up ever since we left
Khabarova. The stormy seas have broken over them, and they have
been rolled here and there in the water on the deck; they have half
hanged themselves in their leashes, howling miserably; they have had
the hose played over them every time the deck was washed; they have
been sea-sick; in bad as in good weather they have had to lie on the
spot hard fate had chained them to, without more exercise than going
backward and forward the length of their chains. It is thus you are
treated, you splendid animals, who are to be our stay in the hour of
need! When that time comes, you will, for a while at l