The floes sometimes close up and float together as a pack, squeezing in everything between them. Sometimes they separate, leaving channels of water between. The pack floats with the wind and the current, and there is little chance of escape from it. If a ship is caught in the ice pack, it must float with it until a storm or some other change of weather breaks up the pack. When a ship is strong enough to resist the pressure of the ice pack, there is some chance of escape in the spring, but so tremendous is the power of the ice that Arctic voyagers avoid the pack if possible. It seems to have been De Long’s intention deliberately to enter the pack and drift with it, for when, on September 6, he saw an opening between the Siberian and the American packs, he slipped in. At first the _Jeannette_ pushed her way bravely, but after a few hours she was unable to proceed, and soon she was frozen in solidly. [Illustration: THE “JEANNETTE” IN THE ICE PACK.] To the southwest lay Herald island, which the men attempted to explore. Taking a dog sledge, they traveled to within six miles of the beach, where they found open water, so that they were obliged to return to the ship without setting foot on land. They found the ship drifting with the ice, and in danger of being crushed between the huge masses which surrounded her. Thundering noises from far away could be heard as the blocks of ice ground and grated together. At times the ice separated near the ship, leaving it in clear water. Again, the pack closed up about the stanch little vessel, which was like an eggshell at the mercy of enormous blocks of floating ice. But all this time the _Jeannette_ was drifting, and at length she came in sight of Wrangel Land. Before De Long lost sight of this land, he satisfied himself that it was an island, and not a part of Greenland as some explorers had supposed. On November 10 the black Arctic night began, which lasted until January 25. The bitterness of the cold during this long period of darkness is inconceivable. The surface water was usually at a temperature of 29° F., the freezing point of salt water. Notwithstanding their discomforts, the men followed a regular routine. At seven o’clock in the morning all on board were called and the fires were started in the galleys. At nine o’clock the explorers ate their breakfast. From eleven until one o’clock every man took his gun and went out on the ice to exercise. At three in the afternoon dinner was served, and the galley fires were put out in order to save coal. Between seven and eight o’clock tea was made. The crew lived on pork and beans, salt beef, and canned goods. Sometimes, when the hunters were successful, they had the meat of the seal, bear, or walrus. For amusements there were theatricals and a navigation class.