Our walks were not carried very far from the ship before we discovered that other animals had begun, like ourselves, to take advantage of the returning daylight. Even while the darkness was at its greatest, men carrying lanterns to and from the water-berg or the shore occasionally noticed the little lines of curved scratches left by lemming. What the little creatures could have been doing out on the floes we could not understand; their tracks usually led into deep cracks and fissures of the ice. Perhaps they found warmer quarters near the water. After daylight one could hardly walk half-a-mile on shore without coming across their burrows—little circular tunnels leading long distances under the snow, either to saxifrage pastures, or to warm nests made of grass that must have taken them a long time to collect. Sometimes we came across them sitting near their burrows. They were about the size of a small rat, almost tailless, and as yet in their yellowish white winter fur. Later on, ermine tracks were met with, but they were much less common. They were generally found pursuing lemming, but upon one occasion it was quite plain that the ermine had followed a hare. Of course whoever met a hare track was bound to follow it. Three hares remained in our neighbourhood; they lived in burrows in the snow five or six feet long; two were shot, but the third would never allow us within rifle range. On 29th February the sun rose, but those who climbed to Cairn Hill to see him were disappointed. The high flat land southwards shut him from view. On the 2nd of March, however, when we mustered as usual by sledge crews on the floes beside the ship, bright sunlight lit up the tops of the higher floebergs and shone on the upper parts of the ship’s rigging. The Greenland mountains were already pink, and as the sun approached the gap between them and Cape Rawson, half his orb was seen for a moment by a few who climbed the rigging to look for it; the others thought they could well wait another day after waiting so long. The month after sunrise was a busy time for all hands, for there was much to be done before the whole strength of the Expedition was diverted to the sledging campaign.