had now arrived at the talus below the drift; it came tearing down, together with stones and lumps of snow, in a series of leaps, each longer than the last. It was a strange sight, this great white body flying through the air, and turning somersault after somersault, as if it had been a piece of wood. At last it took one tremendous leap, and landed against an enormous stone. There was a regular crash, and there it lay close beside me; a few spasms passed through it, and all was over. It was an uncommonly large he-bear, with a beautiful thick fur, which one might well wish to have at home; but the best thing of all was that it was very fat. It was so windy that the gusts were apt to blow you over if you were not prepared for them; but with the air so mild as it was, wind did not matter much; it would not have been such bad work to skin it had it not been that it was lying in a hollow and was so big that one man could not stir it. After a time, however, Johansen came, and at last we had got it dismembered, and had dragged it down to the ice and piled it on the sledge. We had not gone far, however, before we found that it would be too heavy for us to draw all at once against this wind and for such a distance. We laid half of it in a heap on the ice and spread the skin over it, intending to fetch it in a day or two; and even then we had difficulty enough in fighting on against the wind in the dark, so that it was late at night before we got home. But it was long since we had so much enjoyed our home-coming and being able to lie down in our bag and sup off fresh meat and hot soup." We lived on that bear for six weeks. "When Johansen was out this morning at six, he thought he saw little auks in millions flying up the sound. When we went out at two in the afternoon there was an unceasing passage of flock after flock out to sea, and this continued until late in the afternoon. I saw two guillemots (Uria grylle), too, fly over our heads. They are the first we have seen. [67] "Wednesday, March 25th. There is the same dark water-sky behind the promontory in the southwest, stretching thence westward almost to the extreme west. It has been there all through this mild weather, with southwesterly wind, from the very beginning of the month. There seems to be always open water there, for no sooner is the sky overcast than the reflection of water appears in that quarter.