“Happy were those who, during the lowest temperature within the first fourteen days of our journey, could really lose themselves during the hours of rest, if only for a short time, for they were generally passed in a painful waiting for a happy release, by—dragging! “This general wakefulness made it unnecessary to set a special watch for bears and foxes, which occasionally made a bold raid upon the stores in the sledge, for they had never yet succeeded in approaching us quite noiselessly. “In spite of all efforts to the contrary, the cutting cold too soon penetrated the sleeping-sack; within the tent the temperature sinks from 60° or 65° to below zero, and the body has to be again refreshed with artificial warmth, by motion and hot food. “The natural consequences of this state of temperature is a continually increasing sensation of freezing until the morning. During the day the sack has got thoroughly cold on the sledge, and must again be warmed by bodily heat, being frozen into thick folds as hard as iron. Whoever lies upon these seems to be lying on laths, which towards morning begin to lose their sharpness. One or the other, we keep a bottle of snow about us. All are shivering, scarcely any sleep. For hours together we are in a state of suffocation, the pressure on either side causing a feeling as though the collar-bone was being forced into the chest and the shoulders crushed. Each lies upon his arm (which of course goes to sleep), and is often prevented from breathing by the smell of train-oil proceeding from his neighbour’s seal-skin. The breath condenses over the face and upon the sloping tent-side, in long snow-webs, which fall at the slightest movement. “The misery of tent-life reaches its maximum during an uninterrupted snowstorm of sometimes three days’ duration. So long as this assumes the form of a hurricane, no one can leave the tent without danger of either being suffocated or blown away. These Greenland snowstorms, which carry small stones with them, greatly resemble West Indian hurricanes, only that the sun is completely darkened by the rush of snow. “Of course our tents would soon have been blown over, if some precautions had not been taken. Great distress reigned within. The wind greatly lessened the already small space by pressing in the walls. Through the canvas, through every stitch or smallest opening, spurts a small flood of the finest snow, like flour out of a flour-mill, or collects itself on the inner surface, where its ever-increasing weight at length brings it down like small avalanches. As long as the storm rages the cold is alleviated from the equalisation of warm air over the sea, though it seldom allows any heat to remain in the tent, so that we were still in a cold of from 14° to 5° F.