"Tuesday, January 29th. Latitude yesterday, 83° 30'. (Some days ago we had been so far north as 83° 40', but had again drifted southward.) The light keeps on steadily increasing, and by noon it almost seems to be broad daylight. I believe I could read the title of a book out in the open if the print were large and clear. I take a stroll every morning, greeting the dawning day, before I go down into the hold to my work at the snowshoes and equipment. My mind is filled with a peculiar sensation, which I cannot clearly define; there is certainly an exulting feeling of triumph, deep in the soul, a feeling that all one's dreams are about to be realized with the rising sun, which steers northward across the ice-bound waters. But while I am busy in these familiar surroundings a wave of sadness sometimes comes over me; it is like bidding farewell to a dear friend and to a home which has long afforded me a sheltering roof. At one blow all this and my dear comrades are to be left behind forever; never again shall I tread this snow-clad deck, never again creep under this tent, never hear the laughter ring in this familiar saloon, never again sit in this friendly circle. "And then I remember that when the Fram at last bursts from her bonds of ice, and turns her prow towards Norway, I shall not be with her. A farewell imparts to everything in life its own tinge of sadness, like the crimson rays of the sun, when the day, good or bad, sinks in tears below the horizon. "Hundreds of times my eye wanders to the map hanging there on the wall, and each time a chill creeps over me. The distance before us seems so long, and the obstacles in our path may be many; but then again the feeling comes that we are bound to pull through: it cannot be otherwise; everything is too carefully prepared to fail now, and meanwhile the southeast wind is whistling above us, and we are continually drifting northward nearer our goal. When I go up on deck and step out into the night with its glittering starry vault and the flaring aurora borealis, then all these thoughts recede, and I must, as ever, pause on the threshold of this sanctuary--this dark, deep, silent space, this infinite temple of nature, in which the soul seeks to find its origin. Toiling ant, what matters it whether you reach your goal with your fir-needle or not? Everything disappears none the less in the ocean of eternity, in the great Nirvana; and as time rolls on our names are forgotten, our deeds pass into oblivion, and our lives flit by like the traces of a cloud, and vanish like the mist dispelled by the warm rays of the sun. Our time is but a fleeting shadow, hurrying us on to the end--so it is ordained; and having reached that end, none ever retraces his steps. "Two of us will soon be journeying farther through this immense waste, into greater solitudes and deeper stillness.