At noon the sun burst through the dense pall of cloud, and an afternoon of dazzling beauty followed, with the good old “Higgins” surging ahead over the long, blue, foaming seas, a sky of sapphire overhead, dappled with a few thin, cirrus clouds and a grand breeze over the beam, giving us about eight knots on a southwest-half-west course. Just at noon the other ship, too, presented a splendid appearance. To begin with, she was a very handsome vessel, and had so altered her position as to be close astern, a little on our weather quarter, distant about one-third of a mile. Her topsails and courses (she had set her main-sail and cross-jack) were swelled out like great cylinders, while her painted ports lent her the dignity of an old-time frigate; and she presented to us a perfect ideal of the poetry of motion as she rolled deeply but easily, now sinking into a valley to her lower yards, now cleaving the lofty crest of a breaking sea which veiled her in a storm of spray. At half-past one we decided to signal her, and ran up our number, to which she instantly replied that she was the “La Pallice”; then we informed her that we were from New York bound to San Francisco, fifty-one days out, while she proved to be from Hamburg for the same destination, and was fifty-nine days at sea; after which we dipped our ensign, which she answered with the tricolor of France. We are reading Nansen’s “First Crossing of Greenland” together with the greatest interest, being one of the most charmingly written of all stories of Arctic work. What a delightful time we will have with his “Farthest North”! We have it on board, but I am waiting till we pass 50° south, so that we can read it in a part of the world almost as rough and desolate as he passed over in his great journey. Latitude, 42° 24′ south; longitude, 52° 36′ west. +July 2+ We had a good breeze from the south all last night and this morning, which put us off to about west by south; but, as our aim for the past four or five days has been to make westing rather than southing, this breeze was most acceptable. The strong wind of yesterday eased up in the second dog-watch last night, and we carried the top-gallant-sails without trouble afterward.