There was not much variety in our life. It consisted in cooking and eating breakfast in the morning. Then, perhaps, came another nap, after which we would go out to get a little exercise. Of this, however, we took no more than was necessary, as our clothes, saturated as they were with fat, and worn and torn in many places, were not exactly adapted for remaining in the open air in winter. Our wind clothes, which we should have had outside as a protection against the wind, were so worn and torn that we could not use them; and we had so little thread to patch them with that I did not think we ought to use any of it until the spring, when we had to prepare for our start. I had counted on being able to make ourselves clothes of bearskins, but it took time to cleanse them from all blubber and fat, and it was even a slower business getting them dried. The only way to do this was to spread them out under the roof of the hut; but there was room for only one at a time. When at last one was ready we had, first of all, to use it on our bed, for we were lying on raw, greasy skins, which were gradually rotting. When our bed had been put in order with dried skins we had to think about making a sleeping-bag, as, after a time, the blanket-bag that we had got rather cold to sleep in. About Christmas-time, accordingly, we at last managed to make ourselves a bearskin bag. In this way all the skins we could prepare were used up, and we continued to wear the clothes we had throughout the winter. These walks, too, were a doubtful pleasure, because there is always a wind there, and it blew hard under the steep cliff. We felt it a wonderful relief when it occasionally happened to be almost calm. As a rule, the wind howled above us and lashed the snow along, so that everything was wrapped in mist. Many days would sometimes pass almost without our putting our heads out of the passage, and it was only bare necessity that drove us out to fetch ice for drinking-water, or a leg or carcass of a bear for food, or some blubber for fuel. As a rule, we also brought in some sea-water ice, or, if there were an opening or a crack to be found, a little sea-water for our soup.