Hans was consulted concerning the Esquimaux, and from him we learned that there was a family living on Northumberland Island, several families on the south side of Whale Sound, and possibly one or more on the north side. Northumberland Island was about a hundred miles distant as we would be obliged to travel in order to reach it, and the south side of the Sound about one hundred and fifty. That we should communicate with these people at the earliest practicable moment was a matter of the first importance. If a sufficient number of the dogs should remain alive when the moon came in December, it was arranged that Sonntag should make the journey at that period, taking a single sledge, and Hans for a driver. If the dogs should all die, then I intended to go down on foot as soon as possible, and do my best to bring all of the Esquimaux to Port Foulke and Etah, use their dogs while we needed them, and feed and clothe the people in the interval. Meanwhile, however, we could only wait through the mid-December darkness, and hope that the month would end more auspiciously than it had begun. CHAPTER XV. THE ARCTIC MIDNIGHT.--SONNTAG STARTS FOR WHALE SOUND.--EFFECTS OF DARKNESS ON THE SPIRITS.--ROUTINE OF DUTIES.--CHRISTMAS EVE.--CHRISTMAS DAY.--THE CHRISTMAS DINNER. December 22d. The sun has reached to-day its greatest southern declination, and we have passed the Arctic Midnight. The winter solstice is to us the meridian day, as twelve o'clock is the meridian hour to those who dwell in lands where the sun comes three hundred and sixty-five times instead of once in the "revolving year." To me these last four weeks have been eventful ones, and I hail this day with joy, and am glad to feel that we are now on the downward hill-side of the polar darkness. The death of my dogs fills me with sadness, and this sadness is doubled when I think that the disaster has sent Sonntag into the dangers of the night to remedy in season the evil.