patch in its middle, at the point where all the rays converged. It
lay a little south of the Pole-star, and approached Cassiopeia in the
position it then occupied. But the halo kept smouldering and shifting
just as if a gale in the upper strata of the atmosphere were playing
the bellows to it. Presently fresh streamers shot out of the darkness
outside the inner halo, followed by other bright shafts of light in
a still wider circle, and meanwhile the dark space in the middle was
clearly visible; at other times it was entirely covered with masses of
light. Then it appeared as if the storm abated, and the whole turned
pale, and glowed with a faint whitish hue for a little while, only to
shoot wildly up once more and to begin the same dance over again. Then
the entire mass of light around the corona began to rock to and fro in
large waves over the zenith and the dark central point, whereupon the
gale seemed to increase and whirl the streamers into an inextricable
tangle, till they merged into a luminous vapor, that enveloped the
corona and drowned it in a deluge of light, so that neither it,
nor the streamers, nor the dark centre could be seen--nothing, in
fact, but a chaos of shining mist. Again it became paler, and I went
below. At midnight there was hardly anything of the aurora to be seen.

"Friday, October 26th. Yesterday evening we were in 82 deg. 3' north
latitude. To-day the Fram is two years old. The sky has been overcast
during the last two days, and it has been so dark at midday that I
thought we should soon have to stop our snow-shoe expeditions. But
this morning brought us clear still weather, and I went out on a
delightful trip to the westward, where there had been a good deal
of fresh packing, but nothing of any importance. In honor of the
occasion we had a particularly good dinner, with fried halibut,
turtle, pork chops, with haricot beans and green pease, plum-pudding
(real burning plum-pudding for the first time) with custard sauce,
and wound up with strawberries. As usual, the beverages consisted
of wine (that is to say, lime-juice, with water and sugar) and Crown
malt extract. I fear there was a general overtaxing of the digestive
apparatus. After dinner, coffee and honey-cakes, with which Nordahl
stood cigarettes. General holiday.

"This evening it has begun to blow from the north, but probably this
does not mean much; I must hope so, at all events, and trust that we
shall soon get a south wind again